METAPHYSICAL GROUNDWORK OF THE F N E WAYS OF

ST. THOMAS AQUINAS

by
Darko PiknjaC

A Thesis
Submitted in conformity with the Requirements for the
Degree of Doctor of Philosophy
Graduate Department of Philosophy
University of Toronto

Copyright O by Darko Piknjai: 1998

Toronto, Ontario, Canada

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 ABSTRACT

METAPHYSICAL GROUNDWORK OF THE FIVE WAYS OF

ST. THOMAS AQUINAS

by
Darko PiknjaE, Ph.D.
1998 Philosophy Dept. at The University of Toronto

The Five Ways are not an instance of what is nowadays understood as the
cosrnological argument. The reason is that the First Cause, or God, to which St.
Thomas' arguments conclude is "the proper cause of the act of being." ( ~ u m m aConea
Gentiles,II. 2 1 . 4 ) But the cosnzological inquiry, in any of its aspects, does not deal with
the act of being. The First Cause encountered in cosmology is insufficient for
understanding the God of St. Thomas. Consequently. St. Thomas' arguments for
God's existence must be viewed in the context of the intellectual activity that deals
with the act of being. This is metaphysics. More specifically, it is the metaphysics
centered around existence as the highest act, and as the act exercised by the effects
of the First or Proper Cause of the act of being.
Therefore, the contcxt of the Five Ways is that of a philosophical activity in
which one tries to reach the ultimate cause in an actual thing of that which
ultimately gives it actuality. For St. Thomas, the act of existence is the actuality of
a11 acts, and is therefore that which gives real things their actuality. But if God is
the proper cause of that which makes things in the world actual, then their
dependence on the First Cause must first be seen along the lines of their act of being
or existence. It will not do, as many contemporary cosmological interpretations of
the Five Ways attempt, to read St. Thomas as arguing only for the ultimate cause of
motion or efficient causality in the actual things in the world. The Five Ways are an
instance of an existentially mctaphysical argument.
 DEDICATION AND ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

My first expression of gratitude goes to rny parents. Your support came to me in

so many different and important ways, that 1 know 1 could not have finished my
doctoral studies in as enjoyable and timely manner as I did. You have provided for
me the one essential element required for the life of the mind: leisure, which is that
form of restful, work-fiee, peace and silence required for the apprehension of reality.
1 also thank Profs. Joe Boyle and Barry Brown of the University of Toronto for
their close work with me on my thesis, and for their very helpful guidance and
correction. If the thesis contains more than a usual number of deficiencies, it is not
due to their guidance but due to my youthful inability to be guided better.
Thank you all. 1pray that God bless you and keep you in his love.
 Table of Contents
..
Abstract ..................................................................................................................................- i i
...
Dedication and Acknowledgments ................................................................................... - i i ~
Table of Contents ................................................. . . ............................................................ iv
Introduction ............................................................................................................................. vi

Part One
THE NEED FOR A GROUNDWORK OF THE FPVE WAYS

CHAPTER 1Modern Opposition to Philosophy of God............................. 2

Some Objections to Reasoning to God's Existence ............................................. 2
J .J .C. Smart's Criticism of Philosophical God-talk ............................................ 6

CHAPTER II Three Interpretations of the Five Ways ................................14

Frederick Copleston's Commentary on the Second Way .................................... 14
Peter Geach's Reading of the First Way ............................ .
...
..................... 20
Anthony Kenny's Critique of the Third Way .................................................... 29

CHAPTER III The General Character and Place of Cosmology and

Metaphysics in Seholastic Philosophy .......................................................... 40
The Thomistic Spectrum of the Speculative Sciences ......................................... 40
Scholastic Cosmology ...................................................................................... 46
Scholastic Metaphysics ....................................................................................... 54

CHAPTER IV The Five Waysand the Cosmological Argument ............... 58

The First Cause of the f i e Ways and its Effects ................................................ 60
The Cosmo~ogicalArgumenttttttttttttttt .................................................................. 72
The Theological Character of the Fiue Ways ....................................................... 77
A Reply to an Objection ...................................................................................... 80

Part Two
AN ENCOUNTER WITH BEING

CHAPTER V A Brief Look at the Character of Firsf Philosophg ............. 96

The Forerunners of Philosophy........................................................................... 98
St- Thomas' Account of First Philosophy ............................................................ 102
 CHAPTER VI The Principies of Being and Knowledge ..............................i i o
What is a Principle? ........................................... .......................................... 112
Natural or Necessary judgments ....................................................................... 113 -
The Number and Character of the Naturally Known First Judgments .............. 116 -
Causlity ............................................................................................................. 119
Finality ..................................................................... ..................................131

CHAPTER VI1 A Glimpse of the Act of Existing....................................... 135

Being and Be-ing ............................................................................................- 136
The Intuition of the Act of Existing ................................................................... 142
The Role of Judgment in Apprehending Existence ..............................................147
The Knowledge of the Act of Existing ................................................................ 151

CHAPTER VIII The Act of Existing and Some Other Acts ...................... 170
Seeing the Problem .............................................................................................170
The Composite of Essence and Existence............................................................ 174

Part Three
FROM BEING TO GOD THROUGK THE FIRST CAUSE OF BEING

CHAPTER IX A Preface to God-talk ................................................................ 188

Metaphysical Preface to God-talk....................................................................... 189
EpistemoIogical Preface to God-talk ................................................................... 208

CHAPTER X Causaiity and the Fhe Ways.....................................................221

The Nominal Definition of God .......................................................................... 222
Causdity Considered Further ........................................................................... - 230
P m Se and Per Accidens Causes ........................................................................... 237

CHAPTER XI The W a y s ....................................................................................... 250

Five Ways To See the Same Thing..................................................................... 250
T h e First W a y ..................................................................................................... 254
The Second Way ................................. . ............................................................. 270
The Third Way ................................................................................................280 -
The Fourth W a y ................................................................................................. 286
The Fifth Way .......................... . . ............................................................294
A Concluding Note .............................................................................................304

BIBLIOGRAPHY .................................................................................................................... 306

 Introduction

AImost all of philosophg is directed tomards the knowledge of God.

S t . Thomas Aquinas, Summa Contra Genfiles

What follows is an attempt to understand five arguments for the existence of

God. They are the arguments of St. Thomas Aquinas known as the Five Ways. The
manner in which I attempt to understand them in this work is not new. My
contribution does not corne in the form of an interpretation; the interpretation 1
offer is one that 1 borrow from a group of more or less like-minded interpreters who
seem to me to have gotten i t right. But it also seems to me that something stands in
the way of our seeing why the interpretation 1offer is correct. That something is the
so called cosmological argument. It is true that several different versions of the
cosmological argument have been put forth by philosophers since Immanuel Kant
first classified arguments for God's existence into three basic types: ontological,
cosmological, and teleological @hl/sico-theological).There is not one cosmological
argument. Nevertheless, a contemporary understanding of the cosmological argument
which is often viewed as Thomistic is completely misleading. It is this: St. Thomas
begins his argument for God's existence from some simple fact about the world, such as
that it is full of things that are caused to exist by other things. Much effort is spent by
them that understand St. Thomas' arguments this way in showing that such an
attempt to prove God's existence cannot succeed because the causal relations
between things in the world can be shown to be such that "what everyone calls
God" is not required for a full explanation. And so we are told that "the
contemporary exponent of the [Thomistic] argument probably should concede that
this traditional defense of 5 is unsuccessful-that indeed each contingent thing
exists because of the causal activity of other contingent things in the universe."'
The main contention of this work is that we cannot decide whether or not St.
Thomas' atternpt to demonstrate God's existence is successful if we view his
arguments through the glasses of a cosmological argument. First of all, St. Thomas
does not take as his starting point "some simple fact about the world." He begins
each of his arguments with this or that actual existent existing as being moved, as
moving something else, etc. St. Thomas does not focus on the world, but on certain
features of existents we find in our experience. Secondly. he has a very important
story of what it means to speak philosophically about a being's existence, and what
it is to be caused to exist. Central to this story is his understanding of act and
potency, and a distinction between the act of existence and other acts in actual
beings we encounter in Our experience. These are either cornpletely ignored or less
than adequately explained in contemporary c o s m o l o g ~ interpretations.
l
In order to see how St. Thomas is formulating and putting together the premises
of his arguments we rnust understand the context in which he is working. The word
"context" signifies the philosophical structure erected by St. Thomas in order to
make true statements about GO^.^ The accomplishrnent of the task is dependent
upon having a good understanding of St. Thomas' metaphysics? Thus while I shall

' Michael Peterson, et al., Reason a n d Religious Belief, (Oxford University Press, 1991), p. 79.
2
1 am aware that the overall structure of St. Thomas' thought is theological, that he is first and
foremost a theologian. Nevertheless, that structure contains bodies of knowledge of his day headed
by philosophy. In chapter five we shall examine more closely what for him it means to philosophise in
a way conducive to knowing God.
3 ~ acquire
o such an understanding we shall have to get used to his calling metaphysics a science. 1
shall refrain from using the term as much as possible and substitute for it the expression a legitimate
intellectual actizrity, 1 am doing this because the present intellectual climate considers scientific only
that whic h has been demonstrated through the rnethods of empirical experimentation. But St.
Thomas holds that the kind of phi1osophical activity where one thinks about God is a particular kind
of intellectual activity which is different enough from other kinds of inteIlectua1 activities t o be a
special kind of science. Here we corne upon the first indication of the need to separate contemporary
be providing a context for the Five Ways I shall also be saying something about the
character of St. Thomas' metaphysics.
But why must the proper context of the Five Ways be that of metaphysics, and
what does it mean to Say that the context is rnetaphysical? In order to answer we
must notice what St. Thomas, in most general terms, says about rnetaphysics. He
calls it by three different names: theology, metaphysics, and first philosophy. These
names arise, for him, from the fact that metaphysics has as its subject matter God,
being, and first causes of things? The context, then, of St. Thomas' metaphysics is
that of philosophizing about God in terms of first causes of being, and the aim of a
metaphysical demonstration of God's existence is to reach God as the first cause of
being. This may be asserted on the basis of St. Thomas' claim that "the proper cause
of the act of being is the first and universal agent, namely ~ o d . " 'For reasons that 1
do not see, many commentators of the Five Ways attempt to understand them
without paying any attention to this claim. My position is that the claim is the key
to a proper understanding of the Five Ways! Any interpretation of St. Thomas'
arguments for God that does not give an adequate account of St. Thomas'
understanding of being, act and potency, and, what St. Thomas calls, proper and first
cause, is of little or no help to a contemporary reader. If, philosophically speaking,
God is for St. Thomas the first and proper cause of the act of being, then an
argument for God must involve philosophizing about being, actuality and
potentiality, and proper causality.

context and terminoIogy of philosophical God-talk from St. Thomas'. Unless we do so, we shall not
only disable ourselves from reading profitably the Five Ways, we shall also impose upon his
arguments the kind of reasoning he does not empIoy.
'1 assert this on the basis of St. Thomas' prologue t o his commentary on Aristotle's Metaphysics
which I shall translate and discuss in some detail in chapter five.
St. Thomas Aquinas, Summn Contra Gentiles, II, 21, 4, trans. by Anton C . Pegis, (Notre Dame:
University of Notre Dame Press, 1975). This work shall henceforth be referred to as SCG. In De Ente
et Essentia (On Being and Essence), trans. by A. Maurer, (Toronto: PIMS, 1968)' ch. IV, 7, St.
Thomas says that "the first being, which is being in dl its puriS...is the first cause, or God."
 If philosophizing about God, therefore, is an activity in which we seek t o
discover the highest cause of things, what does it mean to speak of such a cause? I
take this to be the most important question facing an interpreter of the Five Ways.
It is important because our understanding of what St. Thomas is trying to reach
philosophically will greatly determine how we read his formulation and the joining
together of the premises of his arguments. Our understanding of what St. Thomas
means byfirst or highest cause determines our understanding of his inquiry into that
cause, and different understandings are sure to give rise to opposing interpretations.
1do not rnean to suggest that al1 of the disputes will be settled if common ground is
reached on what St. Thomas means by the first cause, but a general answer to what
he means by it will give us the direction in which to look in order to establish the
context of the Five Ways. It will enable us a t least to decide between contemporary
cosmo~ogicalinterpretations of the Five Ways and the interpretations guided by a
metaphysics in which the act of existing plays the dominant role (see ch. VIII).
What, then, is the meaning of the first or highest cause of things? My small
contribution to the discussion is my own answer to this question. I shall argue in
this work that the first or highest cause means the cause of that in virtue of which
an actual being is ultimately actual-is ultimately caused to be.
Therefore, a proper understanding of St. Thomas' philosophizing about God or
of the highest cause must include an understanding of what, for him, in the final
analysis makes an actual thing actual or what makes a being exist. This, St. Thomas
says is being (esse). "Being is the highest perfection of all. Being is the actuality of al1
acts, and therefore the perfection of al1 perfections.'" It is only upon learning

St. Thomas Aquinas, De Potentia ( O n the Power O/ God), trans. by English Dominican Fathers,
(Westminster, MA: The Newman Press, 1952). q. VII, a. 2, ad 9. Henceforth De Pot. See also Surnma
Theologiae, 1, q. 4, a. 1, ad 3, "Existence is the inost perfect of ail things. for it is compared to al1 things
as that by which they are made actual." Translation of the Fathers of the English Dominican
Province. This work shall henceforth be referred to as ST.
something of St. Thomas' understanding of being that we can make sense of his
inquiry into the ultimate cause of the being of things, or the proper cause of their act
of being. The Five Ways are five different demonstrations of the existence of that
cause. Therefore, the context of the Fiue Ways is that of a philosophical actiuity in
which one tries to reach the ultinate cause in an nctual thing of that which ultimately
makes it actual orgiues it actuality. This is a point 1shall stress throughout. 1am not
at this point insisting on a definite description of that in virtue of which, for St.
Thomas, an actual thing is actual. But I do hold that any discussion of the Five
Ways rnust develop along the lines of philosophizing about the highest cause
causing in an actual thing that in virtue of which it is ultimately actual, because
only in that way can i t be said that we have reached the highest cause. Even though
we may interpret St. Thomas' understanding of being in more than one way, we
cannot without such an understanding put forth a plausible interpretation of his
demonstration of the proper cause of the act of being which is God. In chapters
seven and eight 1 shall suggest a possible interpretation of St. Thomas'
understanding of being. For now 1 suggest only that this point gives us the right
direction for determining the proper context of St. Thomas' arguments in the Five
Ways, as well as that along which any plausible interpretation of the Five Ways
rnust develop. St. Thomas' own general description of metaphysics, about which 1
shall Say more in chapter five, seems to point us in that direction.
A main contention of this work is that a profitable reading of the Five Ways can
only be attained if we acquaint ourselves with the metaphysics and epistemology of
the author of the Five Ways, and if we allow ourselves to be so acquainted without
placing on St. Thomas the context of any non-scholastic metaphysics and
epistemology. We must, therefore, guard against an approach to the Five Ways that
pays little or no attention to some metaphysical treatments of important points St.
Thomas makes in his two Surnmae, and in his commentaries on Aristotle's
Metaphysics, Physiw, and Poste?orAnalytics.
W e must also keep in mind that Summa Theologiae and the Five Ways were in
St. Thomas' day given t o students of theology taught by magistri who had a good
grounding in the metaphysics of the schools.' St. Thomas clearly expects that
philosophizing about God be preceded by a great deal of knowledge.
In order to know the things that the reason can investigate concerning God, a knowledge of
many things must already be possessed. For almost al1 philosophy is directed towards the
knowledge of God, and that is why metaphysics, which deals with divine things, is the 1st part
of philosophy to be learned. This means that we are able to arrive a t the inquiry concerning the
aforementioned truth only on the b a i s of a great deal of labour spent in study. Those who wish
to undergo such labour for t h e mere love of knowledge are f e ~ . ~

We, however, give the Five Ways to undergraduate students who have little or
no philosophical training of any kind, let alone of scholastic philosophy, and then
explain to them why St. Thomas' arguments fail to prove God's existence using
modern philosop hical met hods t hat ignore key Thomistic insights. 1 have found this
to be a frequent practice among contemporary philosophers of religion who place
the Five Ways into a group of arguments called cosmological, and then proceed to
criticise them by way of modern and contemporary philosophical methods devoid of
St. Thomas' philosophy of beingg1 offer here an alternative.

7
For a detailed explanation of scholastic educational methods and of the curriculum of the liberal
arts in the twelfth and thirteenth centuries, see Maurice DeWolf, An Introduction to Scholastic
Philosophy, trans. by P. Coffey, (New York: Dover Publications, 1956), specially ch. 1, sect. 9. See
also St. Thomas Aquinas, In Librum de Causis, lect. 1, where St. Thomas insists that undergraduates
are to apply themselves to the divine science (which is metaphysics and not sacred theology) where
questions of God's existence and attributes are addressed after logic, mathematics, and cosmology.
SCG, I , 4 , 3 .
See, for example, William Wainwright. Philosophy of Religion, (Belmont, CA: Wadsworth, 1988).
William Rowe, Philosophy of Religion, (Belmont, CA: Wadsworth, 1993), Michael Peterson, et al.
Reason and Religious Belief , (Oxford University Press, 1991), John Hick, Philosophy of Religion,
(Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice Hall, 1990), Yeager Hudson, The Philosophy of Religion (Mountain
View, CA: Mayfield Publishing, 1991), David Stewart, Ejcplonng the Philosophy of Religion
(Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice Hall, 1992).
 x

I am aware that a deeper and broader grounding in scholastic metaphysics than I

offer here is necessary for a full understanding of the Five Ways. But I attempt here
to provide the basic outlines of the groundwork and context of the Five Ways
which should enable anyone to see how the mind of St. Thomas operates as he
argues for God's existence. It should enable contemporary critics of St. Thomas to
see where exactly they ought to point their criticism if they wish it to be effective
and to have their efforts worth considering.
Finzlly, 1 shall not commit myself in this work to a n elaborate defense of St.
Thomas against objections to his arguments for God's existence, nor to a defense of
his metaphysics. But I will try to present his arguments and their metaphysical
context in as compeiling a manner as I can.
In Part One 1 attempt to show that a groundwork of scholastic philosophy of
being is necessary for a good understanding of the Five Ways. That this is so
becomes clear in chapter two where 1 consider three contemporary interpretations
of the first three Ways which either fail to make use of some key concepts St.
Thomas employs, or make use of them in ways that can only be made clearer within
a wider framework of Thomistic philosophy of being. In other words, the
interpretations considered in chapter two shed little o r no light on St. Thomas'
claim that God is the proper cause of the act of being.
The four chapters of Part Two are designed to show the role metaphysics has in
St. Thomas' overall project, and the centrality of being and its highest act which is
existence. Part Three naturally flows from Part Two as a continuation of philosophy
of being which deserves its own title, that of natural or philosophical theology. The
connecting point between philosophy of being and natural theology is causality and
its very center which, for St. Thomas, is existence. Thus chapters eight and ten are
key, because they show how, in the Thomistic context, we reach the very possibility
of engaging in philosophizing about God, and how that philosophizing must unfold.
 Pafi One

THE NEED FOR A GROUNDWORK OF THE FIVE WAYS

 CHAPTER I

Modern Opposition to Philosophy of God

"Then if you don 't know what I rnean what right have you to cal1 it nonsense?" asked the pincess.

George MacDonaId, The Princess and the Goblin

Some Objections to Reasoning to God's Existence

In popular conternporary texts in philosophy of religion one often cornes across
objections t c the sort of philosophizing about God that we are attempting to do in
this work. Medieval scholastic metaphysics has been under strong attack since the
eighteenth century when David Hume and Immanuel Kant put forth formidable
arguments against the very possibility of engaging in philosophical demonstrations
for God's existence and for some of his attributes. We cannot here expound on their
arguments,'' but we can point out that the main line of their objection is that
knowledge can be legitimately acquired only by way of sense-experience and only of
that which can be experienced. But God is not experienced through our sense
faculties. Therefore, meaningful and true statements about God are out of reach for
the hurnan mind.
Perhaps the best known twentieth-century opposition to philosophical God-talk
is that of logical positivism. Its objection rests on what it calls the 'vsrification

10
For a good study of Hume's and Kant's positions on the knowablity of God seeJames Collins, God
in Modern Plzilosophy, (Chicago: Henry Regnery Co., 1959). ch. 4 and 6.
principle.' A. J. Ayer, in his Language, Tmth and Logic, puts forth a strong and a
weak formulation of the principle, discards the strong as far too drastic a criterion of
meaningfulness, and decides that the weak version is sufficient to dismiss as largely
nonsensical al1 philosophical claims about God. The weak principle is as follows:

We Say that the question that must be asked about any putative statement of fact is not, Would
any observations make its truth or falsity logically certain? but simpiy, Would any observations
be relevant to the determination of i t s truth or falsehood? And it is only if a negative answer is
given t o this second question that we conclude that the statement under consideration is
nonsensical. "

Because al1 philosophical statements about God clairn to make factual assertions
about things that are not objects of sense experience, no observation can be relevant
to their truth or falsehood, consequently we can Say, according to Ayer, that such
statements are nonsensical and have no philosophical value.
Another twentieth-centur-y objection to the possibility and meaningfulness of
philosophical God-talk comes in the form of a discussion under the title 'Theology
The objection is that claims such as 'God exists', 'God created
and Fal~ification."~
the world', and 'God loves us as a father loves his children', are always made and
qualified by theists and religious believers in such a way that nothing could count
against them.

Someone tells us that God loves us as a father Ioves his children. We are reassured. But then we
see a child dying of inoperable cancer of the throat. His earthly father is driven frantic in his
efforts t o help, but his Heavenly Father reveals no obvious sign of concern. Some qualification is
made-'God's love is not a merely human love' or 'it is an inscrutable love', perhaps-and we
redise that such sufferings are quite with the truth of the assertion that 'God loves us as a father
(but, of course, ...).' We are reassured again. But then perhaps we ask: what is this assurance of
God's (appr~priatelyqualified) love worth, what is this apparent guarantee really a guarantee
against? Just what would have to happen not merely (morally and wrongly) to tempt but also
(logically and rightly) to entitle us to say 'God does not love us' or even 'God does not e ~ i s t ' ? ' ~

'' A. J. Ayer, Language, Tmth and Logic, (New York: Dover Publications, Inc., 1952). p. 38.
" See the discussion between Antony Flew, R. M. Hare, and Basil Mitchel in New Essays in
Philosophical Theology, ed. by A. Flew and A. MacIntyre, (New York: Macmillan, 1955).
131bid. p. 98.
 The difficulty seems to be that theists are failing to realise that meaningful
statements must exclude the possibility of other facts which, if they should occur,
would falsify the theisti statements. That is, a statement about God which purports
to square with a particular state of affairs, but does not successfully exclude other
possible states of affairs which allows for an adherence to the t m t h of statements
regardless of what occurs, is not really a statement. But the claims about God are
always so stated and qualified that they do not allow even for t h e possibility of
considering claims that could count against them.
The objections to philosophical God-talk on the basis of both the verification
and falsification principles maintain that theists make their claims about God in
such a way that anyone insisting on experiential criteria for knowledge cannot argue
against them, and that therefore, from the point of view of philosophers insisting on
such criteria, the claims are rneaningless.
These objections have slowly lost their appeal over the last forty years. They
seem to be claims not primarily concerned with philosophical thinking about God,
but with the very nature of philosophical thinking. Modern empiricists and logical
positivists make their objections to philosophizing about God on the basis of their
understanding of what it means to know something. But the question of what it
means to know anything ought to be settled between disputants well before the
question of the knowablity of God can be entertained. We ought, for example, to
settle this question first: What are the faculties of the human mind, and how and
what do they know? For if the human mind is so tied to sensory experience that it is
capable only of knowing sensible particulars, ideas of a being transcending al1
possible sense experience could not plausibly be entertained by such a mind. But is
the human mind exclusively such a faculty? St. Thomas certainly does not think so.
Along with this question we ought to settle this one: Are the faculties of human
knowledge the measure of the real which, as real, is knowable, o r is the real the
measure of the power of the faculties of human knowledge? A philosopher like Kant
thinks the former is the case, while Aristotle and St. Thomas think the latter is the
case. There cannot be a meaningful debate about the knowability of God between
philosophers operating within epistemologies sternming from positions that are this
radically opposed. Unless they first find common ground from which the very
questions of their debate can be formulated, the debate will not be joined a t the
issue.
1s it, for example, the case that for a logical positivist the notion of God cannot
even arise as a meaninghl notion? If so, how does the content of his objection to
scholastic theism, for example, even have any meaning for him as a logical
positivist? Could he possibIy know, within his understanding of what i t is to know,
what a scholastic is talking about when talking about God? If not, his objection
does not arise from a good understanding of his opponent's position. Would not also
then al1 scholastic responses to his objections necessarily be as meaningless to him as
the very notion of God? This makes for circumstances too infelicitous for a
profitable debate. The only way to improve the circurnstances is to move the debate
to the more fundamental questions regarding human knowledge and its proper
objects. But at that point objections based o n verification and falsification
principles are not yet concerned with philosophizing about God, and may not even
reach such a concern.
Furthermore, a claim that something cannot be known, which amounts to saying
"1 know that it cannot be known," poses great difficulties because it amounts to a
daim of not knowing while retaining the advantages of knowledge. If there cannot
be knowledge of that which, for example, transcends experience, we cannot know
that there cannot be. Why not? Knowledge that there cannot be such knowledge is
itself knowledge that is beyond experience, and according to modern empiricists and
positivists there can be no such thing. These philosophers claim to be operating
solely with the knowledge that is on the level of experience, but no such knowledge
can yield the knowledge that there is no knowledge beyond experience because such
knowledge is itself beyond experience. They are not merely saying that natural
reason does not know,for example, that God exists, but that natural reason cannot
know that God exists. This is a daim to knowledge about the unknowable, and such
entertainment of strong notions about the unknowable is not only puzzling but it is
very difficult to see how it can be seriously entertained at all. And yet it has
occupied the minds of contemporary thinkers considered by many to be worth
taking seriously. We shall d o better, 1 think, if we exert our intellectual efforts on
the arguments put forth by philosophers operating with epistemologies that are
significantly different than those of modern empiricists and logical positivists.

J. J. C. Smart's Criticism of Philosophical God-Talk

Before we examine scholastic arguments, let us consider another type of
objection to philosophizing about God. In the rniddle of this century, in an article
entitled "The Existence of God", an Australian philosopher J.J.C. Smart developed a
twofold attack on attempts to prove God's existence. Srnart insists that any such
attempt is "radically unsound" and that it "rests on a thorough absurdity".'" His
criticism is fairly brief but it is representative of some fairly influential twentieth-
century thinking about demonstrations of God's existence, and for that reason it
deserves consideration.
The first part of Smart's attack deals with what is known as the cosmological
argument-an attempt to demonstrate God's existence which takes as its starting
point some general fact about the world from which it then seeks to reach God by

'9.
j.C. Smart, "The Existence of God," The Como~ogicalArguments, ed. by Donald R. Burrill
(Garden City, NY: Doubleday, 1967). p. 267 and 270. Originally this work was a n article which
appeared in the Church Quarterly Reuim (1955).
way of principles of causality and sufficient reason, and the impossibility of an
infinite causal regress. Smart takes al1 such attempts to proceed in this way:

[to] explain why something exists and is what it is, we m u t explain it by reference to something
else, and we must explain that thing's being wbat it is by reference to yet another thing, and so
on, back and back. I t is then suggested that unless we can go back to a logically necessary first
cause we shall remain intelIectually unsatisfied. We should otherwise only get back to something
which might have been othenvise, and with reference to which t h e sarne questions can again be
asked."

The main point of Smart's criticism at this stage is that al1 attempts to
demonstrate God's existence by way of a cosmological argument make the mistake of
resorting, in the final analysis, to a claim that the proposition "God exists" is a
logically necessary one. It is this kind of necessity on which such attempts depend
to secure their conclusion. By logical necessity Smart means a necessity that arises
out of "the rules for the use of the ~yrnbols"'~
we employ t o express necessary
propositions. In other words, if we ask, what makes the necessary propositions
necessary, the answer is the rules for employing the symbols to express the
propositions, the symbols which we ourselves have invented. But the problern with
the proposition "God exists" is that it is meant to be an informative proposition, a
proposition that purports to tell us what is the case, and "no informative proposition
can be logically ne~essary.'"~
Therefore, any attempt to dernonstrate God's existence
by way of the cosmological argument is largely a futile activity. It is clear from the
way Smart talks throughout his article that he regards the Five Ways as instances of
the cosmological argument, and that for him every interpretation and defense of St.
Thomas' arguments are attempts working within the context of this type of
argument which makes them subject to a criticism that an informative proposition
cannot be regarded as Logically necessary.

15
Ibid. This comment reveals Smart's understanding of what the scholastics cal1 the impossibility of
infinite causal regress. As we shall see in chapter ten, this is an inaccurate understanding.
Ibid.
l6

"Ibid.
 This aspect of Smart's attack on attempts to demonstrate God's existence does
not pose a serious threat to our attempt at understanding St. Thomas's arguments in
the Five Ways. In the conclusion of Third Way, for example, St. Thomas says that
we must posit the existence of a being whose necessity cornes from itself and does
not receive it from another and which causes in others their necessity. It is clear
that when in Third Way St. Thomas says that a necessary being exists he is not
saying that "God exists" is a logically necessary proposition (in Smart's sense of the
word Zogical); nowhere in the Third Way does he even mention or imply logically
necessary propositions. What precisely St. Thomas means requires a good deal of
carehl reading and interpreting of al1 of the Five Ways. But even without such a
reading we are not in any way cornpelled to regard a discussion of a necessary being
as identically a discussion of a logically necessary being; a necessary being may also
mean a being that is indestructible, or a being that has never come to be and can
never cease to be. Furthermore, Anthony Kenny points out that the incoherence of
"necessary being" has not been clearly shown by philosophers like Smart because "it
has not been shown that the necessity of necessarily true propositions derives from
hurnan convention; there is much evidence, in the recent history of philosophical
logic, in the contrary direction."18 So much, then, for the first part of Smart's attack.
The second part consists in a defense of the claim that the question "'Does God
exist?' is not a proper question."1gThis, 1think, is a far more serious objection to any
attempt to understand the Five Ways, for if Smart is right, there is nothing to be
understood in the Five Ways because the Five Ways are an attempt to answer a
question that does not and cannot arise from a real intellectual need. Smart likens
the question to questions like "Does virtue run faster than length?" and "How fast
does time flow?" which are grammatically correct questions but not meaningful

18
Anthony Kenny, The Eue Ways, (New York: Schocken Books, 1969). p. 2.
19
Smart, op. cit.,p. 270.
questions, that is, they are not really asking anything. Smart's reason for holding
this position is closely tied up with his insistence that any God-talk is possible only
within a religious context.
Smart is very clear that he does not regard religious worship of God as a
meaningless activity on the grounds that God cannot be sensibly regarded as
logically necessary. God may still be sensibly spoken about, and he may still be
regarded as necessary, just not logically necessary. He may, for example, be
theologically necessary. What does that mean? Smart gives an analogy from physics
in order to explain.

It is not a logical necessity that the velocity of light in a vacuum should be constant. It would,
however, upset physical theory considerably if we denied it. Similarly it is not a logical necessity
that God exists. But it would clearly upset the structure of Our religious attitudes in the most
violent way if we denied it or even entertained the possibility of its faisehood. S o if we Say that it
is a physical necessity that the velocity of light in uacuo should be constant ... similarly we can
say that it is a retigiouc necessity that God exists?

Just as we could not continue to do physics along the lines of the present theory
without positing the physical necessity of light's constant velocity in a vacuum, so
we cannot be Christians, for example, without positing the religious or theological
necessity of God's existence.
We may ask, as we did in the case of necessary propositions, what is the source of
theological necessity? Smart's answer is this: Our being religious, that is, our being
conuerted to some religion like Christianity. The t heological necessity of God's
existence does not rest on a proof, on "a metaphysical argument a priori ... [where it
can only rest] on absurdity born of ignorance of the logic of Our lang~age."~'
It is a
necessity that becomes apparent only to them that take the plunge, so to speak, into
religion, it is apparent only to the converted, and they stand in no need of
metaphysics.

"~bid.pp. 270-1.
' Ibid. p. 27 1.
 But what about those that do not take the plunge? Can they engage in God-
talk? No, says Smart, certainly not meaningful God-talk! Asking the question,
"Does God exist?" as an unbeliever is like asking, "Do electrons exist?" as someone
who has never performed an experiment with cathode-ray tubes and knows nothing
about the Wilson cloud chamber. The very concept of electron cannot enter our
minds until we are well immersed into the theories and experiments of modern
physics. Just so, the very concept of God, and along with it the question "Does God
exist?" cannot enter our minds until we are converted t o some religion where "the
word God gets its meaning [and its usehilness] from the part it plays in religious
speech and l i t e r a t ~ r e . "But
~ once we are converted the question of God's existence
no longer cornes up. So, to a religious person the question of God's existence is
superfluous and for t h e unbeliever it has no meaning. And with that we can and
should put to rest al1 philosophical God-talk.
But how is it that for over two thousand years the questions about God and his
existence has been entertained philosophically? Smart does not Say, but given his
position we can venture a guess as to what he might Say. Religion is older than
philosophy and so religious believers have talked about God amongst themselves
and to the unbelievers throughout history. They spoke and wrote about various
supernatural revelations in which God has made himself known to people, has laid
down for them laws according to which they are to relate to him and to one another,
has given them promises of good things in this life and in the life to corne. They have
interpreted certain baffling events in their lives and in the physical world around
them to God's power and guidance. The word God thus acquired currency in human
speech. Then along came philosophers inquiring about anything and everything and
thought it quite within their philosophical rights to inquire into this God or gods
everyone seerns always t o have been talking about. Suddenly philosophical
questions regarding God's existence and attributes came to be raised. This has been
going on until some modern philosophers tried, more or less successfully, to put an
end to it. In the twentieth century philosophy came to be conceived by many as
exclusively an activity of logical and linguistic analysis, that is, logic and the
philosophy of language were regarded as philosophy proper. Philosophers of this
sort made even more progress in putting an end to the philosophy of God. Finally,
Smart in his article "The Existence of God" put the last nail into the coffin of al1
philosophical God-talk by showing us just how self-contradictory and absurd it is.
In chapter seven we shall encounter another way in which philosophical God-
talk can arise, a way that does not depend on religion, nor as a response to the
question, "Does God exist?". But we can note at this point that Smart seems to be
erroneously identihing believing in God with being religious. He seems to think
that it is impossible to hold that God is real and not t o be religious. This is contrary
to facts. 1 know people who have never been exposed to any kind of organised
religion, nor had an experience we would cal1 a conversion,but who also believe that
a higher being is in some way involved in the world. An expression like "God damn
it," or "honest to God" often crosses their lips, and they do not think it to be either a
religious expression like "Praise the Lord," or an entirely meaningless phrase.
Furthermore, Smart's suggestion that the notion of God arises only in the rninds
of the religious, that it is meaningful only to believers, cannot be tcue if atheism is
p o s ~ i b l e~. ~e a n - ~ aSartre's
ul atheism, for example, is a philosop hical one resting on
his argument about human freedom. What he argues against is primarily a general

Dogrnatic philosophical atheisrn is not the sarne as unbelief. An atheist thinks there is no God, no
Supreme Being to whom we owe our existence, nature, and devotion; he thinks no higher being exists
that could give rise to a religious life. An unbeliever, on the other hand, has no faith and trust in a
God whose existence he is quite prepared to grant, and whom he sees as a legitimate object of
worship for some but not for him.
belief in some higher being people cal1 God, not this or that religion. So if it is
possible to engage in a philosophical argument that there is no God, it is also
possible to engage in a philosophical argument that there is God.
But a far more serious objection may be put to Smart. His case against the
possibility of philosophical God-talk rests on the daim that God-talk is meaningful
only within a religious context, only among those who have been converted to some
religion. Until a person is converted to some religion, Smart insists, the word "God7'
and the question "Does God exist?" are meaningless. But this clearly cannot be
correct. For how can a person become converted to Christianity without having in
one's mind the notion of God? To be converted to Christianity is not to be
converted to the notion of God. The Christian claim is "Jesus of Nazareth is God,"
and it asks us, "Do you believe that, and are you willing to let him be your God?".
We could neither assent nor withhold Our assent to the Christian claim without
already possessing the notion of God. In Judaism the first of the ten commandants is
"you must have no other gods beside me." How can this be a commandment to
someone who does not already possess a notion of God? Srnart's analogy, then,
between religion and modern physics, between entertaining the notions of God and
electrons, does not apply to religion, and certainly not to Judaism and Christianity.
His notion of theological or religious necessity is therefore not a good one.
Furthermore, Christians are told by St. Paul that everyone possesses some
understanding of the reality of God independently of religious worship.
For al1 that rnay be known of God by men lies plain before their eyes; indeed God himself has
disclosed it to thern. His invisible attributes, that is to Say his everlasting power and deity, have
been visible to the eye of reason ever since the world began in the things he has made. There is
therefore no possible defense for their conduct; knowing God, they have refused to honour him
as God, or to render hirn t h a n k ~ . ~ '

" Romans 1A9-20- The New English Bible.

 St. Paul is clearly saying that everyone knows God without special revelation
and understands himself to be in a real way related to Him. If what St. Paul says is
true, and a Christian like St. Thomas believes it is, a rational demonstration of God
beginning with "the things he has made" (not with rational concepts like perfection
or with concepts of logical necessity) is possible. W e can conclude, then, that
Smart's objection to a philosophical God-talk on the grounds that i t is meaningless
is not one that excludes a t the outset our attempt to understand the Five Ways. But
Smart does, however, force us to consider how phiIosophical God-talk anses for St.
Thomas. Such a consideration is part and parce1 of a preparation of the proper
context of the Five Ways.
In the following chapter we shall examine three interpretations of some of St.
Thomas' arguments in the Five Ways in order to see if they can help u s understand
how St. Thomas is arguing to God, and if they can contribute to an establishment of
the context in which St. Thomas is working.
 CHAPTER II

Three Interpretations of the Fine Ways

"Tellme," said Faraday to Tyndall,who mas about
to show him an experment, "ceil me what 1 am to
look for."

Frederick Copleston's Commentary on the Second Way

Frederick Copleston is well known in academic circles as a historian of
philosophy. In his less historical and more philosophical work entitled Aquinas he
devotes a section where hi tries to make clear for the modern reader St. Thomas'
arguments for God's existence, or at least to safeguard them against some
misconceptions to which contemporary readers may be liable. He warns that it is
"impossible to discuss these arguments profitably unless they are first understood.
And misunderstanding of them is only too easy, since the terms and phrases used are
either unfamiliar or liable to be taken in a sense other than the sense intended?j
This is very good advice. But we must also notice that in order to know what St.
Thomas intends i t is not enough simply to look a t the Five Ways themselves,
because in them St. Thomas does not tell us how he intends the terms and phrases
he is using but seems to be assuming that we already know them. In other words, we

a ~rederickCopleston. Aquinm, (London: Penguin Books, 1955). p. 122.

need to develop a proper context for the arguments. Copleston attempts to make a
contribution to this end.
He thinks the First and the Second Ways are similar and may be understood
along the same lines. I shall concentrate on his explanation of the Second Way,
which St. Thomas states in the following way.

The second way is taken from the nature of the efficient cause. In the worId of sense we find
there is an order of efficient causes. There is no case known (neither is it, indeed, possible) in
which a thing is found to be the efficient cause of itself; for so it would be pnor t o itself, which is
impossible. Now in efficient causes i t is not possible to go on to infinity, because in ail efficient
causes following in order, the first cause is the cause of the intermediate cause, and the
intermediate cause is the cause of the ultimate cause, whether the intermediate cause be several,
or only one. Now to take away the cause is to take away the effect. Therefore, if there be no first
cause among the efficient causes, there will be no ultimate, nor any intermediate cause. But if in
efficient causes it is possible to go on to infinity, there wilI be no first efficient cause, neither will
there be an ultimate effect, nor any intermediate efficient causes; al1 of which is plainly false.
Therefore it is necessary to admit a first efficient cause, to which everyone gives the name of
~od?

According to Copleston, the data to be explained in the Second Way is active

agents or efficient causes? The explanation of this data must proceed in a twofold
way. First, it must be shown "that there is a hierarchy of efficient causes, a
subordinate cause being dependent on the cause above it in the hierarchy.""
Secondly, it must be shown that this hierarchy cannot infinitely regress, and that we
must therefore posit a special, that is, a first cause at the top of the hierarchy, which
is God.

Some understandifig of efficient causes is necessary to make sense of the Second Way; in fact, the
better our understanding of St. Thomas' exphnation of them, the better we can understand the
Second Way. For now, let St. Thomas' general definition of cause suffice. "A cause is said to be that
from whose existing another follows." The finciples of Nature, in Selected Wn'ting of St. Thomas
Aquinas, trans. by RP. Goodwin, (New York: The Macmillan Publishing Company, 1965). p. 17. In
another place St. Thomas defines i t as "that upon which the existence of another follows."
Commentary on Aristotle's ~ h s c strans.
, by R. Blackwell, et al. (London: Routledge & Kegan Paul,
1963), Bk. II, ch.3, lect. 10, n. 240.
" Copleston, op. cit., pp. 121-122.
 Coplestonls contribution to the explanation of the first point amounts to
showing that what is meant by the hierarchy of efficient causes is not a temporal
series, as for example the series child-parent-grandparent. The hierarchy has to do
with the dependence of efficient causes on another cause for their activity of causing
whatever they do efficiently cause. In other words, the efficiency of efficient causes
is in the present dependent on the causal activity of another for their activity of
efficiently causing something in another here and now. For example, a child, in
order to produce a change in another, is no longer dependent on the parent,
grandparent, etc., but is dependent on some factor like the life-preserving activity of
the air for its efficiency, that is, without the effciency of air to preserve the child's
life, the efficiency of the child to produce whatever change it produces in another
cannot take place. Copleston offers another example. When a pen is marking up a
page, that activity of the pen is at that moment dependent upon the activity of a
person's hand, which is in turn dependent on the causal activity of other factors.
This gives us a clearer focus on the data of the second way. I t is the dependency
of efficient causes on the causal activity of another causing in them their own
efficiency. In other words, the data is causes causing, and the question is why are the
causes dependent for their activity of causing an another efficient cause?
The second point of St. Thomas' argument in the Second Way follows closely
upon the first. Infinite regress of causal activities causing the efficiency of
subordinate causes is impossible. The regress in question, says Copleston, is not a
horizontal, temporal regress, but a vertical hierarchy. The regress is impossible
because the dependence of efficient causes on ariother cause for their efficiency
cannot infinitely recede upward; it cannot because such a regress of dependence
would mean that the entire hierarchy would never get started-every cause in the
hierarchy would be dependent, and a set of dependents is impotent to cause in
another that which it does not have. Therefore, a non-dependent efficient cause
must be a member of a set of efficient causes. Such a cause is special, special enough
to be the First Cause.
Recall the first example above. The life-preserving efficiency of air is itself
dependent on the efficiency of some other factor (thus the more natural science we
know the better), and this factor is itself dependent on another, and so on. "Unless
there is a 'fint' member, a mover which is not itself moved or a cause which does not
itself depend on the causal activity of a higher cause, i t is not possible t o explain
the... causal activity of the lowest member." [Furthemore] "the word 'first' does not
mean first in the temporal order, but supreme or first in the ontological order.""
And t his first is God.
Can it be said that Copleston's explanation makes the argument of the Second
Way clear? Does Copleston show us why St. Thomas thinks he has demonstrated
God's existence? 1 think the answer to the second question is clearly 'no', but I also
think that Copleston does not try to answer it, and so we cannot charge him with
failing to do so.
The usefulness of Copleston's explanation with respect t o the first question
depends on whether or not he has explained well the data of the Second Way. It is
clear that he identifies the data correctly: the efficient causal ach'uity or operation of
efficient causes. The reason why this data needs explanation is that efficient causes
are here and now, as they exercise their efficiency, dependent on another for that
efficiency-they could not of themselves do what they do. Why not? The answer is
crucial for getting to God! According to Copleston, other factors are required for
the exercise of that efficiency to take place, factors, which the efficient causes
themselves cannot provide and therefore depend upon. The sort of dependency
Copleston has in mind is a dependency upon necessary factors o r conditions for an
agent's causal activity, factors or conditions without which the causal activity could
not take place. What kind of factors? Example: the life-preserving activity of the air
which human efficient causes need if they are to exercise their efficiency (and this
factor is again dependent on other factors for its own efficiency, and so on). Now
Copleston admits that "this illustration is [not] in a11 respects adequate for the
purpose."" He does not tell us why it is inadequate, but he thinks it suffces to show
that St. Thomas is talking about an order of causes that is not in a linear or temporal
series but is a hierarchical order headed by some 'first' cause that must be
understood to be the first ontologically.
But this, in my judgment, is precisely what Copleston does not show. He insists
that there is an ontological hierarchy that needs explaining, but he does not explain
it clearly. We do not see how the life preserving activity of the air and al1 the other
required factors for a child to produce a change in another, reveal a hierarchical
causal dependence that is ontological, and that calls for a radically different member
of the hierarchy, a member so ontologically different that i t deserves the status of a
First Efficient Cause. My main difficulty with Copleston's interpretation of the
Second Way is that 1 do not see what is so ontological about a dependence on air.
Such dependence, and al1 such others in Coplestonls hierarchical series are physical.
The first cause of such a series is then at best a first only because it is not dependent
on some physical factor. This by itself is not only too negative to be of much help,
but it seems a long way from what everyone would cal1 God.
But Copleston insists that in St. Thomas' argument the "word 'first' does not
mean first in the temporal order, but supreme or first in the ontological order.'"' By
ontological order, Copleston seems to mean a rnetaphysical order. My assumption
here is based on his concluding remarks on the Second Way where he argues that

.30
Ibid. p. 122. -
' Ibid.p. 123.
cause must be understood as St. Thomas intended it, if an interpretation or a
criticism of the Second Way is to be valid. He points out that presurnably St.
Thomas "would have said that the sufficiency of a phenornenalistic interpretation of
causality for purposes of physical science proves nothing against the validity of a
metaphysical notion of ~ a u s a l i t y . "In~ other words, criticisms of the Second Way
operating within the context of Hume's or Kant's philosophy do not as such directly
address themselves to the arguments of St. Thomas, and for that reason they do not
pose a serious threat t o a claim that St. Thomas has successfully demonstrated
God's existence. A profitable discussion of the arguments in the Five Ways is only
possible if we f i n t establish a metaphysical groundwork along the lines of St.
Thomas' metaphysics where his notion of causality receives the fullest treatment.
Copleston insists that this is what we must do, but he himself does not do so, giving
us instead a non-metaphysical understanding of the dependence of the intermediate
cause upon the firstcause. That is why his account of St. Thomas reasoning is
insufficient for a good understanding of the Second Way. I n fact, as I have tried to
show, his account is misleading. If we try to follow him in the direction he points
out, we shall not end up where St. Thomas thinks he has ended up-we shall not end
up with the First Efficient Cause understood metaphysically (in terms of being),
because the dependence of causes in a hierarchical series for their act of causing is
explained by Copleston only along physical lines."

*~bid.pp. 123-124. By "metaphysical notion of causality" Copleston rnay mean a notion that
differentiates between, what is known as, perse and per accidens causality. But if he dues, he ought to
explain what it means and t h e bearing it has on the argument of t h e Second Way. Furthemore, it
seems to me that a clear distinction must be made between instrumental and principal causes and the
specific character of their causal activity for a good indication of h o w St. Thomas thinks he is arguing
to the First Cause who is God. See pp. 272-278 below.
The distance between Coplestonpsexplanation of the dependence of the intermediary cause on the
first cause and St. Thomas' understanding of the dependence on the first cause o r God is made
apparently wide in the following passage from SCG,If, 52, 7. "Since every agent acts so far as it is in
act, it belongs to the first agent. which is most perfect, to be rnost pedectly in act .... Act itself is more
Peter Geach's Reading of the First Way
Like Copleston, Peter Geach tries to help the modern reader not acquainted
with scholastic philosophy t o understand how ~ t Thomas
. is arguing for God's
existence. His help comes in a twofold way. He first offers an explanation of what
the general character of the arguments in the Five Ways is like, and then he points
out what they cannot be like.
In his "Commentary on ~ q u i n a s " Geach suggests that the arguments in the
Five Ways have the following form: "since the world is of such-and-such a nature,
there must be some being who made it and keeps it going; we give this being the
name ' ~ o d ' . "Furthermore,
~ we must understand St. Thomas' attempt "to proue
there is a God [as an attempt] to proue that somebody made everything else, in the
relevant sense of the verb 'made'.""By "relevant" sense of making Geach means a
sense applied to God by analogy with other already familiar senses bringing out the
similarities and differences between ordinary uses and the special use applying only
to God.

For exarnple, in one respect the use of the word ['making'] when appIied to God is more like 'the
minstrel made music' than 'the blacksmith made a shoe'; for the shoe is made o u t of pre-existing
material, and, once made, goes on existing independently of the srnith; whereas the minstrel did
not make the niusic out of the pre-existing sounds, and the music stops if he stops making it; and
similarly God did not make the world out of anything pre-existing, and its continued existence
depends upon his a c t i ~ i t ~ . ~

perfectly in act than that which has act, since the latter is in act because of the former....Now this act
is being, wherein generation and al1 movement terminate, since every form and act is in potentiality
before it acquires being. Therefore it belongs to God alone to be His own being, just as i t pertains to
Him to be the first agent." The interniediate cause, therefore, stands in relation t o t h e first cause as
one whose act of being is actualised by the one who is that act. Now that sounds unmistakably
ontological or metaphysical! This points out the right direction for reaching the proper context of
the Second Way.
" 'Aquinas' is Part Two of a three-part work by G.E.M Anscombe and P.T. Geach entitled Three
Philosophen, (Oxford: Basil Blackwell. 1963). Section 11 of 'Aquinas' is reprinted in The Comological
Argument, ed. by Donald R Burrill, pp. 58-82.
Peter Geach, "Cornrnentay on Aquinas," in The Cosmoiogical Arguments, ed. by D. Burrill, p. 58.
lbid p. 59.
Ibid. p. 60.
 This understanding of the character of the arguments in the Five Ways is
further supported by Geach when he argues that the Five Ways have often been
misread by the interpreters who insist that St. Thomas is proving God's existence
from the existence of some randomly chosen thing in the world, rather than from
the existence of the whole world. What gives Geach confidence in claiming that
such a reading is a misreading is that an answer to a causal question regarding this
or that individual thing need not be God: "the cause of a man's existence, Say, is that
he was generated by his parents."" It will not do, Geach continues, to point out that
the man's parents were also caused to exist by the generative act of their parents,
because the causal question regarding the existence of the first man was
satisfactorily answered by finding out who his parents are. In other words, "we need
not bring into account al1 the past and perished generations of men, and it is no
matter whether they were a finite or infinite series." The reason why a finite or an
infinite series is irrelevant here is that a whole series is a secondary cause "used
instrumentally by the First Cause."" But in order to see that the whole series is in
fact a secondary cause used instrumentally by the First Cause we must, Geach
assumes, employ his understanding of what St. Thomas is doing in the Five Ways;
that is, the only way left to us for reaching God's existence is from the existence of
the world as a whole. Thus we must see that

what is in fact essential to the "Five Ways" is something tantamount to treating the world as a
great big object. If the world is an object, it again seems naturd to ask about it the sort of causal
questions which would be legitimate about its parts. If it began to exist, what brought it into
existence? In any case what keeps it from perishing, as some of its parts perish? And what keeps
its processes going? And to what end?"

%fbid.p. 6 1 -
391bid.p. 62.
'O IIbd. p. 63. By "world" Geach means "earth, solar system, galaxy. cluster of galaxies , ..." in other

words, everything that in any way is except God, if there is a God.

 Seeing no difficulty with the suggestion, Geach proceeds to interpret the Five
Ways. A careful reading of the Five Ways, he says, will reveal that at least four of
the Ways "quite clearly depend on the legitimacy of that lumping-together of things
by which one would pass from particular things to the world as a whole."" Geach
thinks the first two Ways may be treated together because the only difference
between them is that the First has to do with things changing and the Second with
t'hings coming to be."
Let us then consider the First Way. St. Thomas' argument is as follows.

The fiist and the more manifest way is the argument from motion. I t is certain, and evident to
our senses, t h a t in the worId some things are in motion. Now whatever is in motion is put in
motion by another, for nothing can be in motion except it is in potentiality t o that towards
which it is in motion; whereas a thing moves inasmuch as it is in act. For motion is nothing else
chan the reduction of something from potentiality to actuality. But nothing can be reduced from
potentiality to actuality, except by something in a state of actuality. Thus that which is actudly
hot, as fire makes wood, which is potentially hot, to be actually hot, and therefore moves and
changes it. Now it is not possibIe t h a t the same thing should be a t once in actuality and
potentiality in the same respect, but only in different respects. For what is actually hot cannot
simultaneously be potentially hot; but i t is simultaneously potcntially cold.' It is therefore
impossible that in the same respect and in the same way a thing should be both mover and
moved, i.e,, that it should move itseIf. Therefore, whatever is in motion must be put in motion by
another, and that by another again. But this cannot go on to infinity, because there would be no
first mover; seeing that subsequent rnovers move only inasmuch as they are put in motion by the
first mover; as the staff moves only because it is put in motion by the hand. Therefore, it is

" Note that Geach does not say that the data of the First Way is change or motion, but things as
changing o r rnoving. This is significant, and it also points us in the right direction. Some interpreters
tliink the First Way is intended as a lesson in a physicist's understanding of motion. But if that were
the case, St. Thomas would not cal1 it "the more manifest way." A physicist's study of motion
requires a great deai more than that which is visible to the senses, whereas a moving thing is very
accessible t o the senses.
But Geach's suggestion that the data of the second way is things coming to be is, 1 think, wong.
Copleston's understanding of the data is more accurate. However, both Copleston and Geach seem
to me to underestimate, and even faiI to grasp clearly, the difference between t h e data of the First
and Second Ways. The data of the First W a y is beings being moved; the data of the Second Way is
beings moving another. The former are patients and the latter agents. T h e difference here is great;
agents act while patients are recipients of action; patients become something while agents cause
another to become something. The ways t o God's existence from these vastIy different starting points
are far more different than Copteston and Geach seem to appreciate. This alone makes their attempts
a t understanding St. Thomas' arguments short of satisfactory.
 n e c e s 7 CO arrive at a first mover, put in motion by no other; and this everyone understands ro
be God.
Using the example of a thing becoming hot, which is to Say that it is undergoing
a change, we can Say that it undergoes that change because it is caused to by
another thing. But it may be that this change invoked in the first thing by the
second is due to a process that is caused in our second thing by a third thing which
may act upon the second thing because its process is caused by a fourth thing, and
so on. In order to read St. Thomas properly here, Geach thinks we must lump
together the second, third, fourth, and al1 the subsequent things and cal1 it 'the
world', and predicate of each one of Our things as we22 as of the world the causal
activity of producing change in our first thing. But each one of our things and the
world are causing the process of change in our first thing only insofar as they
themselves are in process of change, that is, only insofar as they are themselves
being changed or caused. We need to ask then what keeps this process in the entire
collection of things. The answer must be some thing which is itself not in the
process of change and does not come to be in that process, for if it were, it would
only be a part of the changeable system of the whole collection which we called the
world, and as such it would not be the cause of the process in the world. "Thus we
are led to a changeless cause of the change aiid coming-to-be in the world."" This,
Geach thinks, is what St. Thomas means by "that which al1 men cal1 God."
Our evaluation of Geach's explanation should begin where he begins, namely,
with the claim that what is central to understanding the argument of the First and
three other Ways is the "lumping-together of things by which one would pass from
particular things to the world as a whole." The first point to note about this claim is
that Geach makes it without any textual support from the writings of St. Thomas.

43
ST, 1, q. 2, a. 3.
" Geach, opcit.. p. 65.
This calls his scholarship on the matter in question. Where, in the Five Ways, or
anywhere else in related discussionsl does St. Thomas even imply such a move?
Certainly in the First Way we find nothing of the sort. Where in his other writings
dealing with first causes and God does St. Thomas speak about "lumping together"
the objects in the world into a great big object? Geach provides us with no textual
evidence. 1suggest that is because there is none.
What Geach does offer, however, are some reasons for making his claim, reasons
that are at least his, if not St. Thomas'. The first of these is his insistence that in
arguing for the existence of God St. Thomas is arguing for the Maker of the world;
the First Cause is a maker, and the job it has a s the cause is to make. Geach insists
on this on the grounds that "since the world is of such-and-such 2 nature, there
must be some being who made i t and keeps it going; we give this being the narne
'God'." What is it about the world which calls for its Maker? What is that nature
which must be explained in terms of the Maker? Geach does not specifically Say, but
in his explanation of the argument in the First Way, for example, it is clear that he
sees the world as dependent. It is this feature of depmdency in the world which calls
for its ~ a k e r ?
Brian Davies, a contemporary scholar of St. Thomas, agrees with Geach on this
point.
Philosophicalfy speaking, God is required to account for what we can now observe, and he
accounts for it in its presentness as we observe it. In this sense, P. T. Geach is rght to Say that
Aquinas thinks of God as the Maker of a worId which c m , if you like, be viewed as 'a great big
object' equally dependent on God at al1 times... Our efforts to cope with certain causal questions
like 'Why is this thing changing?', or 'Why is this thing there a t all?', imply the need t o raise
further questions. W e can ask why the water turned brown, or why there are donkeys, but this
ought to lead us to ask why there is change a t al1 or why there is a world at dl."

or rny own view of the properly Thomistic understanding of dependence upon a cause, and of the
difference between being made and created by the first cause, see pp. 61-66 below.
" Bran Davies, The Thought of Thomas Aquinas, (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1992). p. 39.
Geach would perhaps not appreciate Davies' help by way of questions like 'Why are
there donkeys?' because for him the donkey's parents are a satisfactory answer, but
a full answer to the question 'Why is this thing changing?' cannot be another thing
which is also in some way undergoing change, as it moves another, and so on. But
every single thing in the world is undergoing change which reveals the character of
dependency of things in the world and consequently of the world as a whole. So we
must posit the First Cause of change, or the Unchanged Changer.
The difficulty with this interpretation is that it does not sound like St. Thomas.
More precisely, it does not sound like the metaphysics of St. Thomas; it looks like
cosmology (world as a cornplete and total collection of things) of Leibniz and Wolff,
but it in no way resembles the metaphysics of being as being of St. Thomas. To view
the First Way as an attempt to "lump together" beings in the world into a whole or
a "cosmos" is to operate a t the level of cosmology. An interpretation of the First
Way that is more faithful to the texts of St. Thomas would notice that al1 of his
philosophical God-talk is inextricably tied up with his notions of being, cause of
being, actuality and potentiality. But in Geach's explanation of how St. Thomas
philosophically reaches God there is not even a mention of what St. Thomas means
by cause nor what the notions of potentiality and actuality, which are clearly used by
St. Thomas in the First Way, have to do with the argument for God's existence. An
explanation and the context of these terms is indispensable for understanding the
crucial second premise of the argument: "whatever is in motion is put in motion by
another, for nothing can be in motion except it is in potentiality t o that towards
which it is in motion; whereas a thing moves inasmuch as it is in act."" Geach's
explanation by way of the-world-as-a-great-big-object does not shed any light on

l t should arouse our wonder here that St. Thomas says a thing can be in act to some extent. What
does that mean? What are the extents of actuality? 1s that what calls for a cause-the actuality of
things? We shall have to pay attention to that!
this prernise. It does not help us understand the need for the First Cause of changing
(moving) things conceived as actualised potencies, which is clearly St. Thomas'
conception of them in the First Way.
Geach needs to rnake full use of the concepts of potentiality, nctuality, and cause,
because St. Thomas is obviously making use of them. Without such a use any
interpretation of the Five Ways is incomplete, and therefore misleading.
Furthemore, a discussion of potentiality and actuality invariably involves, within
the Thomistic context, a discussion of being because for St. Thomas act and potmcy
issue from being." But Geach's metaphysics of totalities, his philosophizing about
the world-as-a-great-big-object. is not in line with St. Thomas' philosophy of being,
and therefore not in line with that from which issue two key concepts of the First
Way .
The second point upon which Geach's interpretation depends is his insistence
that St. Thomas could not possibly be "proving God's existence from the existence
of some casually chosen thing.'" St. Thomas could not b e so proving God's
existence because if, for example, a thing in question is a human being, the cause of
his or her existence is the parents, and "the answer need not be 'God': the cause of a
man's existence is that he was generated by his parents.''= B u t a production of a
newly generated human being is an instance of change in the world, which
ultimately requires a First Cause. For Geach, God as the First Cause uses 'second
causes' (parents) as instruments to produce an individual human being." In other
words, the instrumentality of the parents, through their generative power, gives

"See the prologue to St. Thomas cornmentary on Aristotle's Metaphysics.

@ Geach, op.cit., p. 61. This insistence is important to Geach because, if tme. i t eliminates an
alternative to his approach.
"O Ibid.
51
Ibid. p. 62.
their offspring existence, and God as the First Cause gives to the parents their
generative power.
Two points can be made by way of response to Geach on this point. First, in
order to understand what it means t o Say that "parents are like 'second causes' used
instrumentally by the First cause,'" and in order to be sure whether St. Thomas
would in fact Say that, we need a fairly detailed account of St. Thomas' conception
of causality, and particularly his distinction between principal and instrumental
causes. Geach's assertion about St. Thomas' understanding of the causal activity of
the First Cause is simply that, an assertion, which we can neither understand nor
evaluate without an account of principal and instrumental causes.
Secondly, it is not clear that Geach's insistence that for St. Thomas one's parents
can cause one's existence through their generative power is correct. St. Thomas
makes the following point which gives reason to doubt or at least to qualih Geach's
position.

Now a11 created causes have one common effect which is being, atthough each one has its peculiar
effect whereby they are differentiated: thus heat makes a thing to be hot, and a builder gives
being to a house. Accordingly they have this in common that they cause bez'ng, but tfiey differ in
that fire causes fire, and a builder causes a house. There must therefore be some cause higher
than al1 other by virtue of iwhich they dl cause being and whose proper effect is being: and this
cause is ~ o d . ~

Thus it is true that parents, as efficient causes of their offspring, produce a being,
but they do so "by virtue of some cause higher than al1 other." The offspring,
therefore, is dependent for its being not only on its parents, but far more so on God.
More important still is the fact that parents are not the cause whose "propereffect is

In chapter ten below 1 shall attempt t o give such an account. That St. Thomas clearly
distinguished between principal and instrumental causes c m be seen by carefully considering De
Ver., q. XXVI, a. 1; SCG,II, 2; III, 13-14; III, 65; De Pot., q. III, a. 11, ad 14;liz VMetaph., lect. 3; ST,
I,q.7,a.4;I,q.46,a.2;1,q.45,a.5;1-II,q.l,a.4.
51
De Pot., q. VII, a. 2.
being"; only God is such a cause. This must be noted when we daim that one's
parents give one existence.
Why is this important for a critique of Geach? It is important because his
understanding of how St. Thomas is conceiving the dependence of beings
undergoing change in the world upon a cause is a t best incomplete. St. Thomas
speaks about a being's dependence on a cause for its existence as something quite
distinct from its becoming this or that thing. Geach seems to be blending them.
When Geach argues for al1 the changing things in the world connected by t h e
change they are undergoing and as such needing the Unchanged Changer, that
connection is not conceived as having two aspects: a connection between things
needing a cause of their becoming this or that kind of thing and a cause of their
being. Geach lumps them together and makes no clear distinction between them
when he reaches the First Cause of change: "Thus we are led to a changeless cause of
the change and coming-to-be in the ~ o r l d . " ~
In order to understand how St. Thomas is conceiving the dependence of things
in the world upon the First Mover, we shall have to include in it their dependence
for their being as something in addition to their dependence for acquiring this or
that change. This calls for a more encompassing conception of cause than we find in
Geach. But in order to acquire a fuller conception we must not read St. Thomas as
one who thinks that one's parents can directly give one being. We shall have to
inquire, by way of a proper Thomistic context, into the cause of being because such
a cause is part of the dependence of its effect upon it, and in order to do that we shall
obviously have to inquire into the Thomistic conception of being. To that end
Geach's interpretation is not only of no help, but a hindrance because it steers us in

56
Geach, op.cit., p. 65.
the direction of not distinguishing clearly enough between the cause of a thing's
becoming and the proper cause of its being.
We can conclude then, that Geach's interpretation of St. Thomas' arguments for
God's existence lacks textual support for the crucial moves on which it depends.
The conception of the world's dependence in Geach's interpretation does not allow
us to reach the Unmoved Mover conceived as the cause of being of changing things
distinct from the cause of their becoming. Geach's interpretation fails to show how
the argument of the F i n t Way fits within the context of St. Thomas' metaphysics,
which is a metaphysics of being as being rather than a cosmology. It also lacks
sufficient explanation of some key concepts St. Thomas employs, concepts like
cause, potentiality and actuality. In fact, it entirely ignores St. Thomas' use of the
concepts of potentiality and actuality which are central to St. Thomas argument. It
seems then that in our attempt to understand the arguments in the Five Ways we
must proceed along very different lines than those suggested by both Geach and
Copleston. W e must proceed along the lines that give an explanation of key
concepts and that show how the concepts are meant and used by St. Thomas to
reach the existence of that which is God.

Anthony Kenny's Critique of the Third Way

Not long after Copleston and Geach offered their interpretations of St. Thomas'
arguments for God's existence Anthony Kenny introduced his well known The Five
Ways. 1 inquire into a part of it here because it represents, in a very pronounced
way, an important approach to the Five Ways. His approach to the Five Ways
consists in regarding them as dependent on data gathered by the science of
cosmology. The direction of his approach and the context of his interpretation is
clearly expressed in the following lines.
 The Five Ways fail principally because it is much more difficult than a t first appears to separate
them h-om their background in medieval cosmology. Any contemporary cosmoiogical argument
would have t o be much more different from the arguments of Aquinas than scholastic
modernisations customarily are.56
For Kenny, then, the Five Ways are cosmological arguments, which for him
clearly means that they rest on, or have their groundwork in comology rather than
ontology or metaphysics. It is within the context of that study, within its objectives
and method, that we must, according to Kenny, understand St. Thomas' arguments
for God's existence, and it is within that context that we must see them as failures.
Having already considered the first two Ways, 1shall turn to Kenny's treatment
of the Third Way. Here is St. Thomas' argument.

The third way is taken from possibility and necessity, and runs as follows. We find in nature
things that are possible to be and not to be, since they are found to be generated, and to corrupt,
and consequently they are possible to be and not to be. But it is impossible for these always to
exist, for that which is possible not to be a t some time is not. Therefore, if everything is possible
not to be, then at some time there could have been nothing in existence. Now if this were true,
even now there would be nothing in existence, because that which does not exisc only begins to
exist by something already existing. Therefore, if at one time nothing was in existence, it would
have been impossible for anything to have begun to exist; and thus even now nothing would be
in existence-which is absurd. Therefore, not al1 beings are merely possible, but there must exist
something the existence of which is necessary. But every necessary being either has its necessity
caused by another, or not. Now i t is impossible to go on to infinity in necessary things which
have their necessity caused by another, as has been already proved in regard to efficient causes.
Therefore we cannot but postdate the existence of some being having of itself its own necessity,
and not receiving it from another, but rather causing in others their necessity. This al1 men speak
of as ~ o d . ~

Kenny sums u p his understanding and criticism of the argument at the end of
the chapter on the Third Way. It is a very helpful summary because it provides a
badly needed map of his reasoning throughout the chapter.

The argument goes: the= are everlasting beings; these rnust be caused or uncaused; they cannot
al1 be caused; so there must be an uncaused everlasting being, which is God. In order to show
that not al1 the everlasting beings can be uncaused, Aquinas refers back to his earlier regress
argument, and we can refer back to its refutation. In order to show that the uncaused everlasting
being must be God, he offers no proof, and we may ask why rnight it not be perpetual,
indestructible matter? If the first part of the Third Way has any force a t ail, the matter of an
everlasting world w o d d be matter with a natural power of everlasting existence. And what
better explanation could one want of an everlasting existence than a natural power for

" nt hony Kenny, The Five Ways.pp. 3-4.

57
ST,1, q. 2, a. 3.
 everlasting existence? In what way would God's general existence be more self-explanatory than
the everlasting existence of matter with a natural indestructibility? A difference between the
two, it seems, could only be made out by saying that God's perpetual existence would be
logically necessary?that of Aristotelian matter would be only naturally necessarys8
Kenny formulates and interprets the argument as he does on the basis of several
reasons. First he appeals to scholarly authority and points out that Guy Jalbert "has
shown that ... Aquinas was converted by the reading of Averroes to a doctrine of
necessity ... [in which he] defined necessity not in terrns of essence and existence,
but in terms of unalterability," and that consequently "something is necessarily the
case if it cannot cease to be the case, and a being has necessary existence if it cannot
cease to exist.'" Secondly, Kenny points out that St. Thomas held that some things
are naturally incapable of ceasing to exist, things like angels, stars, and human souls.
Based on this Kenny insists that the argument of the Third Way "does indeed start
from contingent beings (things which 'have the pcssibility of being and of not
being'), but it works through the existence of caused necessary beings, to the
existence of a being whose necessity is uncaused, which alone, among necessary
beings, can be called Gad?'
Kenny finds the first premise of St. Thomas' argument a bit unclear: W e find in
nature things that are possible to be and not to be, since they are found to be generated,
and to c o m p t , and consequently t h q are possible to be and not to be. He notices that
St. Thomas asserts t h e premise as a fact of experience: "shrubs spring up and wither
away, animals and men are begotten and die," but Kenny finds that this fact does
not shed enough light on the data of the Third Way, and so is not sure "exactly
what entities are being said to have the possibility of being and not being, nor
exactly what is meant by this p o ~ s i b i l i t ~ . "After
~ ' a lengthy exposition Kenny

58 Kenny, op. ck, p. 69.

~bid.
lbid. p. 48.
Ibid. p. 49.
decides that the data of the Third Way, which can ultimately be explained only by
positing God, are "generable and corruptible beings, Le., bodies which consist of
matter which has existed in other forrns and which can survive in altered form their
own d e ~ t n i c t i o n . The
" ~ possibility which these things have of being and not being is
understood by Kenny as "a power of not e x i ~ t i n g . "By
~ this "power" Kenny takes
St. Thomas to mean that "things have a power of not existing 'if the matter in them
is in potency to another form,' i.e. if the stuff they consist of is such that they can
turn into something e l ~ e . " ~
This is how Kenny interprets the first premise of the Third Way. He thinks the
premise is tme and confirmed by modern science. But the rest of the argument does
not sit well with Kenny.
Because Kenny thinks that necessary or everlasting beings are central to St.
Thomas' argument in Third Way, he sees St. Thomas arguing for necessary beings
on the basis of the following claim: given that whatever has the possibility of not
being a t some time is not, not everything can have the possibility of not being.
Kenny thinks the claim is false because he sees no reason why there cannot "be
something which has the power not to exist, but as a matter of fact always does
e x i ~ t . His
" ~ reason is that something could exist forever without having the power
so to exist; it could, for example, continue existing indefinitely "by powers resident
in a succession of external agent^."^ In other words, there is no reason why, in
theory at least, something could not be kept in existence forever by a continua1

lbid. p. 54-55.
albid. p. 53.
"Ibid.
lbid.p. 56.
lbid. p- 63.
succession of efficient causes or agents." Furtherrnore, Kenny also sees no reason
why corruptible things should not "overlap each other, so that each one comes to be
and passes away, but there is never any time when nothing at al1 exists."" In other
words, the universe has not been proven by St. Thomas not to be both contingent
and everlasting, and consequently Kenny thinks St. Thomas has not given us a
reason why we must posit the cause of the universe; at least it does not seem that we
must posit such a cause if we begin our inquiry from the first premise of the Third
Way. As he puts it, "the Third Way quite fails to show it [the world] must be caused,
and by a creator."@
Kenny's main support for this claim rests on the following argument. Given that
matter could easily be perpetual and indestructible, and if the possibility of not
being means that "things have a power of not existing 'if the matter in them is in
potency to another form,' Le. if the stuff they consist in is such that they can turn
into something else," then the universe could consist in contingent beings that are
forever changing from one kind of thing to another. Consequently, the only
necessary, everlasting, and uncaused being can be matter and not God. The Third
Way, therefore, in no way compels our minds even to seek God, let alone to admit
that he exists.
What can we Say about Kenny's critique of the Third Way? Various responses
to it are readily available in ~rint."But I wish to focus on what seem to me to be

It is along these lines that Kenny criticises S t Thomas' insistence o n the impossibility of infinite
regress. We shail discuss St. Thomas' argument in chapter ten.
@ 16id.
@ 16id. p. 69.
"~ o h F.X.
n Knasas, for example, has argued that a different understanding of necessity than Kenny,
following JaIbert, employs is a t work in the Third Way (see his "Necessity in the Tertia Via," The New
Scholasticism, 52 (1978), 373-394).Joseph Bobik has pointed out t h a t use of the reasoning from St.
Thomas' commentary on Aristotle's De Caelo, on which Kenny relies throughout his criticism, is not
needed (see his "The First Part of the Third Way," Philosophical Studies, 17 (1968), p. 150.) John
Quinn has argued that St. Thomas does not need to prove that things which naturally have the
some of Kenny's major omissions or oversights. Let us assume that Kenny correctly
identifies the data of the Third Way as "generable and corruptible beings," i.e.
bodies which consist of matter which has existed in other forms and which can
survive in altered form their own destruction." Let us next ask whether his
following statement is fair to St. Thomas.

If the first part of the Third Way has any force a t all, the matter of an everlasting world would be
matter with a natural power of everlasting existence. And what better explanation could one
want of an everlasting existence than a natural power for everlasting existence? In what way
would God's general existence be more self-explanatory than the everlasting existence of rnatter
with a natural indestructibility?

Kenny's point here rests on an understanding of Aristotelian and Thomistic

conception of matter that entirely ignores some key texts that pertain to this point.
In his first question he seems to be conceiving of matter not only as a being of some
sort (as possessing existence), but also as a being that is independent of something
else, as something of which we may speak as a this. But Aristotle describes matter
differently:

By "matter" 1 mean that which in itself is not stated as being the whatness of something, nor a
quantity, nor any of the other senses of "being". For there is something of which each of these is a

possibility of being and not being are lirnited to a definite arnount of time, as Kenny insists when he
asserts that something which has the power not to exist, but as a rnatter of fact always does exist
could continue existing indefinitely by powers resident in a succession of external agents. (see his
"The Third Way to God: A New Approach," The Thornist,42 (1978),p. 57.)
My irnrnediate concern with an understanding of the data of the Third W a y as generable and
corruptible beings is that St. Thomas does not Say so; he says tliat data are beings that are "found to
be generated, and to corrupt." The difference between the generated and the generable is the
difference between an actual child of an actud parent and some future child of an actual parent; it is
the difference between the actuaI being and the possible being. This means t h a t St. Thomas intends
to reach the necessary being beginning with some actual being, not a possible one. But on what
grounds can he argue for the cause of this a c t u d being? Look at the data again! It is the generated
being, which, because it is generated, is able to be, is generable. W e know this because we see it come
into being fiom another being-the parent. In other words, the actual being t h a t is before us exists,
but not of itself-it is a contingent existent, a being that is a recipient of existence. I t is this fact about
it that calls for a cause. The important question is this: is the child's parent t h e proper cause of the
child's existence o r does it require a much higher cause which al1 men cal1 God? The best way to
answer is to inquire first into what St. Thomas means by proper cause, and we shaII do this in chapter
ten. But Kenny does not look for a cause of a contingent existent. Perhaps the reason is his
understanding of the data from which then issues the general direction of his criticism.
 predicate, whose being is other than that of each of t h e predicates; for al1 the others are
predicates of a substance, while a substance is a predicate of matter. Thus, this last is in itself
neither a whatness nor a quantity nor any of the others; and it is not a denial of any of these, for
even a denial belongs to something accident al^^."
St. Thomas makes a similar point about matter when he says that it "cannot exist of
itself, since of itself it possess no forrn. It does not exist in act, since existing in act
occurs only through a form, but exists only in potency. Hence, whatever exists in
act cannot be called prime matter.""
Thus what Kenny is proposing, in his second question, as a suitable substitute
for God in the first part of St. Thomas' argument in the Third Way is a potency.
Matter as a pure potency could hardly serve as an explanation of an everlasting
existence; it is a principle used in cosmology t o explain generation, but it cannot by
itself serve as a sufficient explanation of anything."
But Kenny seems to be arguing that matter can, within the context of St.
Thomas' thought, be considered a kind of necessary being, as something that does
not by virtue of its nzture come into being or posses the power to go out of being. In
other words, Kenny seems to rely on the Thomistic conception of matter as
something that is neither generated nor corruptible. St. Thomas does in fact regard
matter that way, but he says more than that.
If matter should come to bel there wouId have to be something which is the subject from which i t
comes to be. But that which is the first subject in generation is matter. For we Say t h a t matter is
the first subject from which a thing comes to be perse, and not per accidens, and is in the thing
afier it has come to be ... It foIlows, therefore, that matter would be before it would corne to bel
which is impossible. And in the like manner, everything which is corrupted is resolved into
primary matter. Therefore, a t the very time when prime matter already is, it would be corrupted;
and thus if primary matter is corrupted, i t will have been corrupted before it is corrupted, which
is impossible. Therefore, it is impossible for primary matter to be generated and corrupted. But
by this we do not dmy that it cornes into e~-istencethrough ~ r e a t i o n . ~

"~ristotle'sMetaphysics. tram. by H.G. Apode, (Grinnell, Iowa: The Peripatetic Press, 1979), VII,
3,1029a 20-26.
"~ tThomas
. Aquinas, The Pnnn'pIes of Nature, ed. cit., II, 17.
74The only reason 1 can see why Kenny could honestly fail into such error is his conception of t h e
data of the Third Way as generable or possible beings rather than beings that are in act.
"St. Thomas Aquinas, Commentaq on the Aristotle's Physics, Bk. 1, lect. 15,n. 139, (italics mine).
Clearly, then, even though matter is neither generated nor compted, and in that
sense necessary, its necessity does not reside in itself because it still "cornes into
existence through creation," it is still a recipient of existence, it is still a creature.
This calls for a necessary existent whose necessity resides in itself and it in no way
receives existence; it calls for a being that is not a creature. Therefore, Kenny's
attempt to invoke matter as a self-explanatory substitute for God's eternal existence
cannot be taken seriously as a formidable objection to St. Thomas. He simply
ignores the text we quoted immediately above, as well as the following text.
Whatever is the cause of things considered as beings, must be the cause of things, not only
according as they are such by accidental forms, nor according as they are these by substantial
forms, but also according to dl that belongs to their being ( a d esse) in any way. And thus it is
necessary to say that even pnmary matter is created by the uniueml cause of thingsm
It is clear from text in the Commentay on Physics that for St. Thomas to be
generated is not one and the same as to corne into existence. Some understanding of
this difference seerns necessary for a full understanding of the Five Ways in which
St. Thomas argues for a being which is the cause of other beings coming into
existence. This coming into existence on the part of the creatures is sornething
different from their coming to be by generation. In the above text from the
Cornmmtay on Physics St. Thomas argues that matter does not corne to be as this or
that material being comes to be, but he nevertheless insists that matter comes into
existence. What are these two sense of coming to be? It seems that St. Thomas
differentiates between a being's coming to be as this or that kind of thing, as having
been generated, which is one kind of coming to be, from its coming into existence
simply as an existent, which is another and most fundamental kind of coming to
be?

"sT,1, q. 44, a 2. (italics mine).

n For St. Thomas' twofold understanding of generation and corruption, see his Principles of Nature,
ed. cit.,. I,3-7. Being generated or coming to be is understood here as acquiring a form or an essence
which St. Thomas calls a thing's "coming to be actually". For his distinction between acquiring an
essence and existence, see ST, 1, q. 3, a. 4. Here, even though a thing comes to be, is actualised by its
 Just as matter needs a cause of its existence even though it is neither generated
not corrupted, so do necessary beings like angels, souls, and heavenly spheres.
Kenny thinks that the only argument St. Thomas has for showing "that not al1
everlasting beings can be uncaused ... is his regress a r g ~ r n e n t ,which
" ~ ~ Kenny finds
easy to rehte. But here, too, Kenny is ignoring some relevant texts. St. Thomas
describes these beings as "forms not existing in matter, so that there is no
potentiality to non-being in thern, but rather by their fomzs they are always able to
be.lYnNow even though these beings are necessary, that is, unable not-to-bel St.
Thomas insists, in the above quote from Sumrna Theologiae, that they still need a
cause of their being? Why? Because although their forrns do not exist in matter,
are not inmattered forms, and so have no potentiality by their nature to stop being,
nevertheless, when we consider them "as beings", that is, not as angels, or souls, but
simply as existents, we corne to see their need for a cause of their being, we come to
see them as creatures dependent on a creator, as dependent on a cause for "al1 that
belongs to their being at al1 in any way." Considered as "these by substantial forms"
angels are in virtue of their forms necessary beings, but considered simply "as
beings", they are contingent beings whose necessary forms are created by a being
whose necessity resides in itself and is not in any way received. The Third Way is

form, "existence is that which rnakes every form or nature actual." (For a paraHel texts see ST, 1, q. 4,
a. 1, ad 3; q. 8, a. 1;q. 44, a. 1.) It seems, then, that the way to understand the difference between two
senses of coming to be is to understand them as two hierarchically ordered attainments of actuality:
to come to be or to be generated is to become actual by way of acquiring a f o m , whereas to corne into
existence is to receive that which makes even the form actual. Thomist scholars Vary on how the
latter sense is to be understood. 1 shall mention some of their understandings in chapter seven.
Nevertheless, there are in St. Thomas two senses of corning to be, or becoming actual.
78
Kenny, op. cit., p. 69.
"SCG. II, 30,9. (italics mine)
He insists on the same point in the first Surnma. "Although intellectual substances are not
corporeal, nor composed of matter and form, nor existing in matter as material forms, it is not to be
supposed that they therefore equal t o the divine simplicity. For a certain composition is found in
them by the fact that in them being is not the same as mhat k"SCG,I I , 52, 1. See chapter seven for a
distinction between being and what is.
therefore an argument to God from the creaturely status of beings that are, by their
forrns, either capable or incapable of not-being. What gives them this creaturely
status in the most pronounced way is the fact that they do not possess existence by
their very natures or forms, but are recipients of existence. Another text that Kenny
ignores, even as he considers angels and souls as necessary beings, is the following:

Existence (ipsum esse) is the most perfect of al1 things, for it is compared to al1 things as that by
which they are made actual; for nothing has actuaiity except so far as it exists. Hence existence is
that which actuates al1 things, men their forms. Therefore it is not compared to other things as
the receiver is to the received; but rather as the received is to the receiver.8'

The Third Way, therefore, argues to the giver of that which al1 things but one,
whether generated and therefore contingent or ungenerated and therefore
necessary, receive-exis tence (ipsum esse).
What is needed, however, is a more detailed account of this reception; what is
needed is a Thomistic account of the proper cause before we even consider the Third
Way. But to that end Kenny's interpretation is of no help, in fact it steers us in a
direction in which we shall not even see the need for St. Thomas' account of the
proper cause.
Our attempt, then, to establish the context of the Five Ways will have to
proceed along quite different lines than we find suggested in Copleston, Geach, and
Kenny. In order to do this it seems best to distinguish first between the intellectual
activity in which, according to St. Thomas, one philosophises about God, and that
activity in which arise questions that prompt Our intellects even to begin seeking
the First Cause which al1 understand to be God. The reason why this seems best is
the data from which St. Thomas argues to God-things that belong to the realm of
experience. We shall have to ask this question: How must things in our experience
be seen, if they are to lead to God? For it is clear that the same things rnay be so
considered by a variety of intellectual activities that questions regarding their

ST,1, q. 4, a. 1, ad 3. (italics mine)

dependence on a being that is radically different fiom them do not corne up at dl. In
order to see how they must be viewed so that this dependence becomes apparent to
us, we turn next to a discussion on t h e difference between cosmology and
rnetaphysics.
 CHAPTER III

The General Character and Place of Cosmology and

Metaphysics in Scholastic Philosophy

All things are giuen theirfonn by their boundanes.

Josef Pieper, S c F i o l u s t i ~

The Thomistic Spectmm of the Speculative Sciences

If we are to place the Five Ways in their proper context and provide a
groundwork for them, and if we wish to begin to understand why there are so many
conflicting interpretations of the arguments in them, we must have some
understanding of scholastic cosmology and rnetaphysics. This is tme, in my view,
because al1 interpreters of the Five Ways differ from one another precisely in the
extent to which they insist that the Five Ways are a medieval example of the so
called cosmological argument, and the extent to which they read St. Thomas'
reasoning as belonging to the area of study called cosmology. In order to defend this
daim 1 must first give general outlines of the proper dornains of scholastic
cosmoIogy and rnetaphysics. My task here is sirnply to give the outlines, not to
defend them against any modem and contemporary objections.
 Like ancient Greek philosophy scholastic philosophy is a rational investigation
into full answers regarding the ultimate order and nature of things that are. A
complete explanation of scholasticism would be out of place here because it would
take us into a lengthy discussion. Maurice De Wulf who has developed such an
explanation defines scholastic philosophy this way: "a synthesis or a systern, wherein
al1 the questions of philosophy are treated and al1 their solutions harmonised,
coordinated and made t o stand together.""
For a scholastic philosopher like St. Thomas Aquinas philosophy is a pursuit of
knowledge which satisfies the human mind to the fullest. In its search for wisdom
the human mind is not satisfied with knowing only a few things or a few classes to
which some things belong, but with knowing al1 things and al1 classes of things. This
search for wisdom is characterised by seeking to know the highest causes and
reasons for what things are, where they corne from, and why they are. Furthermore,
the mind wants to know these causes as clearly and certainly as possible. The aim of
a scholastic philosopher is to attain "clear, certain, evident knowledge of the
ultimate reasons and causes, interna1 and external, of things, as far as this can be
reached by the natural powers of the human rnind.lta
The object of philosophy was thought by the scholastics to have a formal and a
material aspect. The forma1 object of philosophy is the highest reasons and causes
insofar as evidence and certainty of them can be acquired by the powers of reason
alone, that is, without the aid of supernatural revelation. The material object of
philosophy is that in which the formal object is sought, namely being-that which al1
things are insofar as they are actual. Chapters five, six, and seven of this work are

" Maurice De Wulf, Hirtonj of Medieual Philosophy, (London: Longmans, Green. and Co., 1909),p.
116. Pages 101-116 of this work contain a helpful discussion of the rnany aspects of scholasticism.
taMichael Shallo, Scholdc Philosophy, (Philadelphia: Peter Reilly Publishers, 19l8), p. 3.
designed t o introduce u s t o the forma1 and material objects of St. Thomas'
p hilosophy.
When a scholastic philosopher inquires into things in the world, he thinks he
can do so in three ways: as they are in themselves, as they are in his mind, and as
they are related to his will. Each of these considerations gives rise to three main
areas of philosophical study: a study of being, or of things as they actually are, Zogic
has the task of determining ways of thinking well, and ethics has the task of
determining ways of directing one's will rightly or of acting morally.
It is the first area that interests us-the study of being, of things as they actually
are. The entire area is theoretical or speculative, rather than p r a c t i ~ a lin
, ~character.
It has three main branches: 1) philosophy of nature, that is, philosophy of being as
mobile or changing, which is the physical universe; 2) philosophy of mathematics,
that is, philosophy of being as quantified and extended; and 3) metaphysics, that is,
philosophy of being as such, as considered in itself? Philosophy of nature has two
branches of its own: cosmology or the science of non-living nature which has the
non-rational world as its object, and psychology which studies living nature.
Metaphysics on the other hand may be divided into general and special. General
metaphysics is sometimes called ontology and sometimes philosophy of being, and it
deals with being as such." The two special aspects of metaphysics are epkternology
or the study of knowledge, and natural theology or the study of God as he may be
known by the power of human reason alone.

Practical philosophy de& with hurnan action. Insofar as it is concerned with individuai hurnan
action i t as called ethics, and insofar as it is concerned with social hurnan action it is called politics.
For a Thomistic distinction between speculative and practical knowledge see ST, 1, q. 1, a. 4; 1, q. 14,
a. 6; De Ver. q. II, a. 8; q. III, a. 3. See also Jacques Maritain, The Degrees of Knowledge, (Notre Dame
Press, 1995), pp. 330-333.
For a more detailed description of the main branches of scholastic philosophy see Michael Shallo,
Scholastic Philosophy, and Jacques Maritain, n e Degrees of KnowZedge.
8 6 shall
~ explain this phrase in the section on scholastic rnetaphysics in this chapter, as well as in the
first section of ch. VII.
 One obstacle that stands in our way of understanding the scholastic thought of
St. Thomas is the difference between our notion of science and his. For us scientific
knowledge par excellence is to be found in sciences like physics where we employ
methods governed by rnathematics, experimentation, and the formation and
verification of hypotheses. Given that philosophy does not employ such a method,
we have divorced things philosophical from things scientific. But St. Thomas uses
the terms science and philosophy interchangeably. For him the philosophical or the
"scientific knower, if he is to know perfectly, must know the cause of the thing
known."" In t h e introduction to his translation of St. Thomas' Expositio Super
Librurn Boethii De Thitute Armand Maurer explains what that means.
[Knowledge] reaches its ideal, not simply when i t records observable connections in nature and
calculates them in mathematical terms, but rather when it accounts for observable phenornena
and the properties of things by bringing to light their intelligible relations to their causes.
Metaphysics reaches this goal when, for example, it explains the contingent universe through
God, rnathematics when it explains the properties of a triangle through its definition, natural
philosophy [cosmology]when it accounts for change through efficient and final causes and the
intrinsic principles of bodies, matter and forrn.
In other words, scientific inquiry for St. Thomas a t its best is philosophicai. It does not aim
simply a t empiriological knowledge through controlled observation and measurement of the
physical world, but rather a t knowIedge of the very being and essential structure of things. Its
goal is ontological rather t han empiriologicalknowledge?

In order t o bring us closer to the Thomistic equating of the scientific with the
philosophical, and to prepare the grond for a clear distinction between metaphysics
and cosmology, we must take a careful look at, what St. Thomas calls, "three kinds
of distinction in the operation of the intellect." He describes them this way:

"~nI Post. Analyt (Commentary on the Postenor Analytics of Alistotle) trans. by F.R. Larcher under
the title (Albany, NY, 1970). lecture 1, p. 15.
@TheDiuinon and Methods of the Sciences, trans. by A. Maurer, (Toronto: PIMS, 1986). pp. ix-x. In
employing the terrns ontological and empiriological knowledge Maurer is foilowing Maritain who
defines them this way: "empiriological analysis deals with sensible being but fimt and foremost as
obseruable and m e a r a b l e ; "ontological analysis ut the fint degree of abstraction deals methsensible
being but deak 7pn-thitfZrst and foremost as intelligible ."Jacques Maritain, Philosophy of Nature, (New
York: Philosophical Library, 1951), pp. 73-88.
 There is one through the operation of the intellect joining and dividing which is properly cailed
separation; and this belongs to the divine science o r rnetaphysics* There is another through the
operation by which the quiddities of things are conceived which is the abstraction of form from
sensible matter; and this belongs to mathematics. And there is a third through the same
operation which is the abstraction of a universal from a particular; and this belongs to physics
and to al1 the sciences in general, because science disregards accidental features and treats of
necessary mattersa
These three distinctions of the intellect's operation, sometimes referred to as three
degrees of abstraction, give rise to three speculative sciences (in the Thomistic
sense) which "are differentiated according to their degree of separation fiom matter
and m~tion."~'
In the first and second degrees of abstraction, or separation from matter and
motion, the intellect studies objects which are dependent for their being on matter.
St. Thomas calis these "natural things," by which he means things "that are bound
up with sensible matter and motion both in existence and in thought."* Because the
dependence of natural things on matter and motion is twofold, it gives rise to two
degrees of abstraction, and consequently to two speculative sciences. If the object's
dependence upon matter and motion is such that it can neither exist nor be
understood without it, the object is called being as mobile (being as subject to
change). The science which studies this object is philosophy of nature or physics, to
which belongs cosmology. If the object's dependence upon matter and motion is such
that it cannot exist without matter but can be understood without i t , "because
sensible matter is not included in their de finition^,"^ the object is called being as
quantified and extended. "This is the case with lines and numbers-the kind of
objects with which mathematics deals.""

" By "divine science" St. Thomas does not mean the science of Sacred Theology, but simply
metaphysics or theology in the Aristotelian sense.
%St.Thomas Aquinas, Diuision and Methods ofthe Sciences, q. 5. a 3. (Toronto, 1986).
91 Ibid. q. 5, a. 1.
Ibid. q. 6, a. 1.
a lbid. q. 5, a. 1.
fiid.
 The third degree of abstraction, which gives rise to the third speculative science
deals with objects that do not depend upon matter and motion for their being. And
they do not so depend because either they are never found realised in matter, or
they are sornetimes found to be realised in matter and sometimes not. To the former
belong God and the angels, and to the latter substance, quality, being as being,
potency, act, unity and multiplicity. To the science that studies these objects St.
Thomas gives t hree di fferent names: divine science or t heology, metaphysics, and
first p hilosophy.
Perhaps the most important point that we should note for the purposes of
establishing the groundwork of the Five Ways is this: St. Thomas' division of the
spectrum of speculative sciences does not allow for regarding philosophy of nature
(and consequently cosmology) as part of metaphysics; the science of physics is not a
cornpartment of the science of rnetaphysics. For St. Thomas, al1 speculative sciences
do not share one same method, and one type of intelligibility. In the natural sciences
the judgment of our intellect "must conform to what the senses reveal about [the
nature of the ~ b j e c t ] , 'while
'~ in mathematics "we must judge ... according to what
the imagination r e v e a l ~ . " ~
But in metaphysics, where we do not study things dependent on matter for their
existence and for their being understood, the intellect grasps its object according to
a different type of intelligibility. In the divine science, the science where we
encounter God's existence and attributes, and this includes the Five Ways, the
intellect proceeds in the following way:

When we know things of this kind [being as such, act, God, etc-] through judgment, our
knowledge must terminate neither in the imagination nor in the senses. Nevertheless we reach
some knowledge of thern through the objects of the senses and the imagination, either by way of
causality (as when from an effect we corne to know its cause, which is not proportionate t o the
 effect but transcends itm), o r by way of transcendence. or by way of negation (as when we
separate from such beings whatever the sense or imagination apprehends). These are the means
of knowing divine things from the sensible world ...
It follows that we can use the senses and the imagination as the starting points but not as the
termini of Our knowledge of divine things, so that we judge them to be the sort of objects the
sense or the imagination apprehends. Now to go to something is to terminate at it. Therefore, we
should go neither to the imagination nor the senses in divine science, to the imagination and not
to the senses in mathematics, and to the senses in the natural sciences. For this reason they are in
error who try to proceed in the sarne way in these three parts of speculative science.%

In the next chapter 1 shall consider some of the implications this difference
between metaphysics and philosophy of nature has on our attempt to develop a
proper context for the Five Ways. For now let it suffice t o note well that the science
in which, according to St. Thomas, a philosopher encounters God is very different
from cosmolog~j;it is different because its object is different from the object of the
other science, and the intellectual activity at work in it is also different from the
intellectual activity a t work in the other science. Let us now turn briefly t o a
consideration of the material and forma1 objects of cosmology and metaphysics.

Scholastic Cosmology
As one of two branches of the science of being as mobile, of the philosophy of
nature, cosmology may be defined as the "philosophic study of the inorganic
" ~ material object of cosmology is al1 things that do not have life in any of
w ~ r l d . The
its forms.
Given this, we in the twentieth century may be puzzled and Say, '1 don't see the
need for cosmoZogy because the sciences like physics, chemistry, geology, and
mineralogy are perfectly capable of investigating the inorganic world.' But recall
that a scholastic philosopher seeks to attain Wear, certain, evident knowledge of the

Clearly, the Five Ways are an instance of this, and therefore an instance of the divine science or
gT

metaphysics and not of cosmology!

"~ i u i s i o and
n Methods of the Sciences, q. 6, a. 1.
Cardinal Mercier, A Manual of Modern Scholastic Phi[osophy. Vol. 1, (London: Routlage & Kegan
Pau1 Ltd., 1960), p. 45.
ultimate reasons and causes, internal and external, of things." The emphasis here is
on ultimate causes. While the rnaterial object of cosmology and the other special
sciences is the same, their formal object is not. The forma1 object of cosmology is the
ultimate reasons and causes, both internal and external, of the inorganic world.
Physicists, chemists, geologists, etc., as such, do not, in the course of their inquiry,
ask questions regarding the ultimate origin of their material object. Their inquiry is
such that there is never an occasion for raising such question^.'^
Mercier describes the threefold formal object of cosmology this way: "(a) The
origin of the inorganic world or its frst efficient cause; (b) its intrinsic constitution
or its ultimate constitutive causes; (c) its destinies or its final cause." He then points
out that "the second of these problems belongs exclusively to cosmology and cannot
be treated el~ewhere."'~'
The other two "problems" cosmology shares with
rnetaphysics, that is, the two other "problems" originate in cosmological inquiry but
their ultimate answers, as far man's capabilities allow, are attained by way of
metaphysical inquiry, which, according to St. Thomas is to be conducted according
to a higher degree of abstraction from matter and motion.
Given that in cosmology a philosopher deals with being as mobile we need to Say
something about Aristotelian and Thomistic conception of motion. This will help us
understand why the threefold forma1 object of cosmology is what it is. But
considering that in the Five Ways St. Thomas reasons from moving or changing
things and from their contingency and non-self-existence to the existence of God as
their cause and as distinct from them, we need to ask ourselves whether, for him, a
philosophical understanding of motion suffices for reaching the knowledge of God's

Im1t is tnie that some of them do entertain questions regarding the ultimate origin of the universe,
but they are then more properly speaking as philosophers rather than chemists, physicists, and
geologists. However, many of these thinkers rareIy entertain such questions in terms of efficient
causality as separate from materia1 causality.
'O' Mercier, op. cit. p. 47.
existence. The answer depends both on how he, as a Christian theologian,
understands God, and on the difference between cosmology and metaphysics and
their respective forma1 objects.
Any philosophic inquiry can begin only when its first principles are discovered.
Aristotle begins his inquiry into being as mobile by pointing out that "we think that
we know each thing when we know the first causes and the first principles... clearly,
in the science of nature [being as mobile] too we should first try to determine what is
the case with regard to the p r i n c i p l e ~ . "In~ ~determining what the principles of
nature are Aristotle follows ancient Greek philosophers who maintained that first
principles must be some contraries or opposites like dry and moist, straight and
crooked, hot and cold. His reason is as follows:

(a) neither must one principle be composed of another principle, (b) nor should they be
composed of other things but the other things should be composed of them. Now t h e primary
contraries possess both these attributes: (b) They are not cornposed of other things because they
are prirnary. and (a) neither of them is composed of the other because they are contrarie^.'^

It will help us to understand the thinking going on here if we keep in mind that
we are observing motion or change: the change of one thing's place and position, the
generation of an oak from an acorn, the change of water from liquid to vapor, the
building of a house, and the learning of some truth by a student- In al1 these cases,
that from which a thing changed lacked the nature of that into which it was
changed. If that were not so, that is, if the thing possessed the nature of that into
which it changed, there would be no change. which is contrary to what experience
tells us. In order that liquid water may become vapor it must first have been not-
vapor. Thus every change involves a pair of not-x and r
We want to know next how many principles there are; how many primary not-x
and x pairs there are. It is plain, Aristotle points out, that there cannot be only two

lmhistotle, Physics, trans. by H.G. Apostle, (Grimell. Iowa: The Peripatetic Press, 1980), 1, 1.
lrnlhid.1.5.
principles because the contraries, the not-x and x cannot act upon each other, but
upon some third thing which is neither not-x nor x. Note also that bynot-x and x we
do not mean a something and its opposite; we are not saying water changes into not
water. By not-x and x we mean an attribute of a something; liquid and vapor are
always in something, are always predicated of something. But somethings and their
contrary attributes do come and cease to be, that is, they are generated and
corrupted. This means, according to Aristotle, that we must posit in addition to
primary contraries (not-x and x ) a primary s ~ b s t a n c e .We
' ~ must conclude, then,
that if natural things (moving and changing things) have principles of which they
"are composed primarily and from which they come to be not accidentally, but come
to be what each of them is according to its substance, then everything which is
generated is generated from a subject and a fon."'" Does this mean there are only
two principles after all? The answer is yes and no, that is, the principles are two and
three: "it is clear that there must be something which underlies the contraries and
that the contraries are two. Yet in another sense this is not necessary, for one of the

lM Aristotle defines substance this way: "A substance, spoken of in the most fundamental, primary,
and highest sense of the word is that which is neither said of a subject nor present in a subject; e g , an
individual man or an individual horse. Secondary substances are said t o be (a) those to which, as
species, belong substances which are called 'primary',and also (b) the genera of those species. For
example, an individual man cornes under the species man, and genus of this species is animal; so both
man and animal are said to be secondary substances."
The most distinguishing mark of substance, Aristotle says, is that it is capable of adrnitting
contrary qualities while remaining numericaIly one and the same. "In other words of al1 things other
than [prmary] substances, there is no one which, being numerically one [and the same], can be
shown to admit of contraries. A colour, for exampte, being nurnerica1Iy one and the same, cannot be
black and white; nor can a n action, which is nurnerically one and the same, be both vicious and
virtuous; and similarly with other things which are not substances. But a substance, being
numerically one and the same, admits of contraries. An individual man, for exarnple, being
[numericdly] one and the same, becomes a t one time light b u t a t another dark in colour, a t one time
warm but at another cold, a t one time vicious but a t another virtuous." Aristotle's Categones and
Pmpositiom, tram. by H.G. A p o d e , (Grinnell , Iowa: The Peripatetic Press, 1980), I,5.
'"lbid.. 1.7.
contraries is sufficient t o produce the change by its absence o r pre~ence."'~
In other
words, the two contraries plus the underlying something (the substratum) make
three principles, but because one of the contraries and the substratum is al1 that is
needed for production of change, there are two principles.
The names that Aristotle gives to the principles reflect his thinking about them:
that which underlies the contraries or the subject he calls matter, the contraries he
calls fonn, and the lack of some form in matter he calls privation. Motion or change
is consequently understood as an attainment of a form by matter, a form which i t
lacked. I n other words, when a natural (moving) thing undergoes the process of
becoming, it cornes t o be out of that which it lacked, o r out of that which it is
potentidy but not actzially.
This brings us t o the next set of concepts operative in a cosmologist's thinking,
namely, potentiality and actuality. Recall again that we are dealing with being as
mobile. For some of Aristotle's predecessors like Parmenides dealing with being as
mobile was an impossibility because the very phrase being as mobile was thought t o
be contradictory. For them being is, and non-being is not; no middle alternative is
possible; change (movement) o r becorning is an illusion o r a trick the mind is prone
to as a result of being immersed in the sensible realrn? But Aristotle noticed that
becoming does not mean coming from being or from non-being, which would be
absurd. Refusing to regard the sensible realm and the becoming or motion of things
as illusory, Aristotle accepts change as real, as a fact given in experience. That fact is
that everything in our experience of the natural realm cornes t o be from something
else. In other words, the thing that changed was what it was, and was able t o
become something else. From this fact we can gather two important concepts. Given

lmIbid.
107
See the coIIection of Parmenides' fragments entitled The Way of Tmth in Philip Wheelwright's
The Pre~ocr~cs, (New York: Macmillan Pubiishing Company, 1966), pp. 96-99.
that every being capable of change is something and at the same time has the
capacity for being something else, we can regard being not only as that which s, but
also as that which can be. The first Aristotle calls actuality and the second
potenti~lity.'~
The division of being into actual and potential has great significance for
philosophizing since al1 philosophizing is of being "For that which, before aught
else, falls under apprehension, is being,the notion of which is included in al1 things
whatsoever a man apprehends."'@ Given that everything we experience, and
therefore philosophise about, undergoes change, every natural object is a mixture of
potentiality and actuality. Now insofar as potentiality belongs to actual things it is
real and not a synonym for nothing (it is not non-being). Note that when we Say
that a being is potentially something else we do not meant that it is potentially
anything else. An acorn can become an oak tree but never a chestnut tree. The
reason is that an acorn is neither actually nor potentially a chestnut tree, that is, its
potentiality for a chestnut tree is not real whereas its potentiality for an oak tree is.
With the concepts of matter, form, privation, potentiality and actuality,
Aristotle is able to elaborate further on the principles of nature, or of being as
mobile. His elaboration gives rise to two of his major doctrines: that of
hylemorphism, and that of the four causes. Both doctrines are an extension of the
primary principles of nature operating in the context of potentiality and actuality.
Hylemorphism is the name of his theory of the composition of every material
substance, or of what Mercier calls the second aspect of the forma1 object of
cosmology: the intrinsic constitution or ultimate constitutive causes of the material
universe. According to Aristotle every material substance is a composite of two

'" Aristotle's introductory discussion of actuality and potentiality rnay be found Physics, 1, 9;
Metaphysics,V,7 and IX.
1 0 9 ~ ~1-11,
1 q. 94. a. 2.
intrinsic principles that make up its nature or essence. The first is a principle of
potentiality and is called mauer ('hyle' means matter), and the second is a principle
of actuality and is called substantial fonn ('morphe' means fonn).
In this further elaboration of the primary principles of nature (moving being)
the positive principles of natter and forrn receive a fuller treatment, while the
negative principle of privation disappears from focus. In addition to the two
intrinsic principles of change (prime matter and substantial f o n ) , Aristotle
introduces two extnnsic principles which are the efficient or agent cause and the
end or the final cause. Thus we have the four causes or principles of nature.t10
We are now in a position to understand a more technical Aristotelian definition
of being as mobile or motion. It should be clear by now that when Anstotle speaks of
motion he is always speaking of moving beings; he does not separate motion from
that which is moving. "Neither motion nor change will be anything apart from the
things named, since there is, in fact, nothing other than the things named.""' Now
things or beings can be in one of three modes: (a) in a state of actuality only, (b) in a
state of potentiality only, (c) in a state of both potentiality and actuality (although
not at the same time and with respect to the same thing). Given that there are only
beings, and that motion is not a being, "there are just as many kinds of motion and of
change as there are of being.""' For example, motion is not a quality like liquid or
vapor, but is relative to liquid and vapor because it is the passage of some being from

"O The narnes of the four causes which Aristotle used are not the names scholastic philosophers gave
them (material, formal, efficient, and final). H e calls them (1) that from which, as a constituent,
something is generated, (2) the f o m or the pattern, this being the formula o r the essence, (3) that
from which change o r coming to rest first begins, and (4) the end, or 'the that for the sake of which.'
See Physics, II, 3.
"' Aristotle, Physics, III, 1, 201a 1, t r a m by Joe Sachs, (New Brunswick, NJ: Rutgers University
Press, 1995).
lt2 Ibid.
liquid to vapor. The fact that in each category of being there is a distinction
between the actual and the potential allows Aristotle to define motion this way:

the actuality of the potentially existing as existing potentially. For example, the actuality of the
aiterable as alterabIe is an alteration ... the actuality of the generable or destmctible [as such] is a
generation or a destruction, and the actuality of the movable with respect to place [as suchj is a
locomotion. 113
This means that the growth of an acorn into an oak is the actualizing of an
acorn's potentiality to be an oak; the purely potential oak is not a motion because it
is in potency only; the hlly grown oak is not a motion because it is in actuality only;
the acorn's growing is a motion because it is the actualizing of the acorn's
potentiality for being an oak. In light of this, motion may also be defined as "the
actuality of that which exists potentially when it is in actuality not as itself but as

Having defined motion t his way, Aristotle was compelled to posit yet another
principle: mhateuer is rnoued is rnoued by something else. Thus, if something is
changing, at each interval of its change it is acquiring a new actuality because
motion is the actualizing of the potentially existing as existing potentially. If, then,
every motion is the actualizing of some potency, everything that is in motion is in
potency in some respect.'15 It follows that nothing can move itself; if it could, it
would have to be in act and in potency in the same respect and at the same time,
which is absurd. But if nothing can move itself, and it is in fact moving, motion or

Il3 ~ r i s t o t l ePhysics,
. III, 1,201a 10-16, tram. by H.G. Apostle.
Ibid. We have here a clear differentiation of levels of actuality. When a being is in actuality as
movable, it is not thereby in actuality as itseIf. The causes of these two 1eveIs of actuality must be
seen as distinct, and must not be blurred into one cause of motion. Consequently cosmology as the
study of causes of motion must not be confused with metaphysics as the study of being. At any rate,
cosmology is incomplete as a scierice of causes; there are higher causes than those cosmology is able
to reach-causes reached in the divine science where God is encountered, for St. Thomas. This will
prove very important for understanding the data of the Ways with respect to their dependence upon
the First Cause. See pp. 61-66 below.
Consequently, if something moves another, if it is causing another be become actual in some
respect, it must be in act exactly in that respect.
change must belong to it only in virtue of the action of an extrinsic cause, an
efficient cause which exercises its action rather than not by virtue of t h e final
cause. ""
It is at this point that the sphere of cosmology proper touches its borders with
metaphysics. If we ask whether the motion of natural or moving things is self-
sufficient and self-explanatory, or whether it is rnoved from outside of nature, we are
probing outside the realm of being a s mobile, outside the realm of nature, and
therefore outside the science of physics. W e need a new science, which St. Thomas
calls metaphysics, first philosophg, and diuine science.

Scholastic Metaphysics
Parts two and three of this work are largely a n exposition of Thomistic
metaphysics, and so it will suffice here only to Say something about the concept of
being, and to give a general meaning of the object of metaphysics which is beng as
such. This will serve both as an introduction as well as the necessary prelude for
establishing the general direction in which to seek the proper groundwork of the
Five Ways.
Being, St. Thomas maintains,"' is the first principle of intellectual knowledge; it
is what our intellect first conceives when we, by Our senses, encounter some existing
object. Our immediate intellectual response upon encountering an existing object is
a judgment that the object exists, and that it is sornething. It is in this immediate
judgment that we, although vaguely, already posses the concept of being as such. A
metaphysician's task, as St. Thomas understands that task, is to make this concept
explicit by distinguishing between being and that which the intellect pronounces a
being. We shall do this in chapters seven and eight.

It6seePhysic.~,VII, 1and VIII, 4. We shall pick up this discussion again in Part Three.
117
SeeST, I,q, 5, 2;ST, 1-11,q. 94,a. 2.
 The English language does not readily lend itself to expressing various meanings
of being with which a metaphysician operates. The same term bekg functions in
several different ways. I t is, first of al!, (A) the present participle of the verb 'to be'.
A helpful way to distinguish it from other meanings would be to write it as be-ing
Being is also (B) a noun, as for example painting is a noun. This noun functions in at
least three different contexts: (B') a being (like 'a painting'); (B") a set of beings
(like a collection of 'paintings'); and (B"') the common nature of al1 beings (or
'paintings'). In metaphysics sense ( A ) ,or be-ing means existence, or the actual
exercise of the act of existing. But sense (B"') is used to express bnng as such, or
that which is common to everything that in some way exists. St. Thomas uses the
Latin word ens to express this meaning of being, and we may Say that ens designates
that by which whatever is real, is real. For sense (A) St. Thomas used the word esse
('to be' or 'be-ing'), and we may Say that esse is that by which the real or ens is
actual. For St. Thomas being (ens) is that whose act it is to exist (esse).'18Thus ens
expresses the subject of existence, and esse expresses the act of the subject whereby
the subject exists. We shall explain this in more detail in chapter eight.
Perhaps the best way to grasp the object of metaphysics, which is being as such,
is to compare it to being as mobile. It will be helpful to recall the different degrees of
abstraction from matter and motion by which the intellect attains the two different
objects. If the object's dependence upon matter and motion is such that it can
neither exist nor be understood without it, the object is called being a s mobile (being
as subject to change). By distinguishing individual marks and the individual matter
of perceptible beings from their common and universai status as changeable
(mobile) and sensible substances, the intellect attains the object of being as mobile.

"' In SCG, II, 54.3 St. Thomas says that "being is the proper act of the whole substance" (ipsum esse
est proprius actus substantiae totius)... and "the substance is called a being" (substantia denominatur
ens). We can Say, then, that existence (esse) is the proper act of a being (ens).
On the other hand, as we have already seen, in the third and highest degree of
abstraction the intellect discerns an even deeper common trait belonging to al1
beings; whether they be mobile or not, quantified or not, they are, they are beings;
they are objects that do not depend upon matter and motion for their being because
either they are never found realised in matter, or they are sometimes found to be
realised in matter and sometimes not. These, St. Thomas says, "are the objects of the
science that investigates what is common to al1 beings, which has for its subject
being as being."
When abstracting in this highest degree, the intellect sees that mobility or
changableness, quality, quantity, even materiality, are not necessary characteristics
of being. That is, the intellect sees that to be is not synonymous with change
(becoming), materiality, quantity, quality, etc. The fact that an object of Our
experience is material, moving, and so on, is different from the fact that it is,that it
is a being. The intellect also sees that the

thing conceived by the intellect is being; because everything is knowable only inasmuch as it is
in actuality. Hence, being is the proper object of the intellect, and is primarily intelligible; as
sound is that which is prirnarily audiblelm

As primarily intelligible, being is prior to the mouing, the materiai, etc.; if a thing's
motion and materiality are mentally set aside, which is a n act of the intellect St.
Thomas calls the highest degree of abstraction, it is still understandable as a being.
Conversely, motion, rnateriality, and al1 other concepts are not understandable
unless bng or that mhich is be understood with it and prior to it. When St. Thomas
says that "everything is knowable only inasmuch as it is in actuality," he means that
being is the proper object of the intellect, that being is what gives the intellect any
content at all, it is what makes anything at al1 intelligible. Consequently, when as

119
St. Thomas Aquinas, Diuision and Methods of the Sciences,q. V,a. 4. ed. cit-
'" ST,I, q. 5, a. 2.
metaphysicians we are looking at things in the world and inquiring into their
highest cause, we are studying them as beings or existents first and foremost.
We can Say, then, that metaphysics, as a science of being as such, studies the
primary and most basic object of al1 thought, the object upon which al1 other objects
depend for intelligibility. The truths of this object apply to everything that is or can
be because nothing is or can be unless it is a being, for if it is not a being, it is
nothing. Now just like the science of being as mobile has its principles, so does the
science of being as such. They are principles of contradiction, identity, causality, and
finality. We shall discuss these in chapter six. Because they are principles of being as
such, of that which is prior to everything, they are absolutely and universally true,
and we rnay reason in tight of them about everything in reality. In addition to its
principles, being as nrch possesses certain basic determinations. These are actuality
and potentiality, existence and essence, substance and accident.
As a product of the highest degree of abstraction, beng as such is synonymous
with immaterial being because it is abstracted from materiality. This means that
inquiries that study properties like mobility and quantity (cosmology and
mathematics), that determine being in so far as i t is affected by materiality, cannot
be an inquiry that has being as such for its object, it cannot be said to be properly
metaphysical, and therefore not the divine science. Proper metaphysics studies its
object in separation from material conditions in which it may or may not be found.
Both the cosmologist and the metaphysician work with being, potentiality and
actuality, substance and accident, but the metaphysician works with them in their
connection to the immaterial being, being abstracted to the highest degree possible
for the human intellect from matter and motion.
With this we have said enough about cosmology and metaphysics to be able to
ask and answer which science provides the more fitting context for an intellectual
inquiry like the Five Ways. This is the subject matter of the next chapter.
 The Five Ways and the Cosmological Argument
"Ail who en concentng essence and being mil2 err men more in other rnatters."

Thomas de Vio, Cajetan, In De Ente et Essentia

The need to establish a proper context of the Five Ways arises as soon as we
begin making our way through several contemporary interpretations of them. What
strikes a newcomer into the discussions as puzzling is the various and seemingly
incompatible understandings of the data of the Ways, which are often stated very
briefly and not clearly. Thus, for example, Peter Geach, says that "the first two
'ways' differ only in that one relates to the process of change and the other to things
coming to be."12' Frederick Copleston, on the other hand, says that "in the first
proof Aquinas considers things as being acted upon, as being changed or 'moved7,in
the second he considers them as active agents, as efficient cause^."'^ Perhaps, upon
reflection and further explanation (which is lacking in Copleston and Geach), we
may come to see Geach's and Copleston's understandings of the First Way as
similar, but we certainly could not do so with respect to the Second Way, for to
come to be and to be an efficient cause can hardly be thought of as the same.
Richard Swinburne thinks the First Way is not properly speaking a cosmological

121
Geach, op. cit., p. 64.
fZ)~opieston,op. cit., p. 121.
argument "since it argues not from the existence of physical objects, but from change
in them."" What Swinburne means when he distinguishes change "in objects" from
physical changing objects is difficult t o ascertain, but t h e Aristotelian
understanding of change o r motion is such that it prevents us from imposing
Swinburne's distinction: "neither motion nor change will be anything apart from the
things named, since there is, in fact, nothing other than the things named."'" In
other words, for Aristotle motion is not something like magnetism whose properties
can be studied apart from existing things. But Swinburne clearly differs from Geach
and Copleston in his understanding of the data of the First Way. And still another
understanding of the data of the First Way can be seen in Joseph Owens who
identifies it as "motion that is actually going on in the sensible world. The integrity
' ~ Owens, moving things in the world
of the fact involves existential a c t ~ a t i o n . "For
can only be fully understood, as the data of the First Way, along the lines of what he
calls "existential actuation."
Differences in understandings of the data of the Third Way are also significant.
Geach understands i t as dealing "with contingent and necessary existence
(Aquinas's actual word is 'possibilia', not 'contingentid; but this does not ~ i g n i f y ) . " ' ~ ~
Anthony Kenny's understanding appears significantly different: "generable and
corruptible beings, i.e. bodies which consist of matter which has existed in other
forms and which can survive in altered form their own d e s t r ~ c t i o n . " ' ~
Al1 these varying and conflicting understandings of the data of the Ways cal1 for
a fresh look a t them; a look that consults St. Thomas. A newcomer into these

123
Richard Swinburne, The Existence of God, (Oxford University Press, 1979), p. 118. n.2.
tu
Aristotle, Physics, III, 1,201a 1, trans. by Joe Sachs.
'"~ o s e Owens,
~h St. Thomas on the Existence of God, ed. byJohn Catan, (Albany, NY: S U N Y Press,
1980). p. 190.
'"Geach, op. nt., p. 65.
Kenny, op. cit., p. 55.
discussions notices that many contemporary interpreters do not bother to consult
St, Thomas in his other texts on how the data on the basis of which one can reach
God are to be understood. Nor do they pay attention t o texts where St. Thomas
explicitly says how God is understood philosophically. A knowledge of how the
Cause, which is understood by al1 as God, and its effects (the data) is to be
understood seems indispensable as a prerequisite for a profitable reading of the
arguments for such a cause. Such knowledge will give us a starting point from which
every interpretation rnust commence if it is to be worth considering.

The Firse Cause of the Five Ways and its Effects

The following two statements of St. Thomas, one from a very early work and the
other from a very late work, give us a clear indication of the direction in which Lies
the proper context of his philosophizing about God. "The first being, which is being
in al1 its purity ... is the first cause, or God."'" "It is evident that mobile being, with
which the philosophy of nature deals, adds to being pure and simple, with which
metaphysics is concerned."'" Based on these statements and on our discussion in
chapter three, we can Say that the difference between philosophizing as a
cosmologist and a metaphysician consists, for St. Thomas, in philosophizing about
mobile being or being as changing and about being pure and simple or being as being.
Only in philosophizing about being as being, only in metaphysics, can one find
"being in al1 its purity, the first cause, or God."
This, 1 maintain, gives us a sufficient warrant to make and defend with further
evidence the d a i m that the Five Ways are not an example of what Kant and the
Wolffian tradition of Kant's day, cal1 the cosmological argument. W e may put the

128
On Being and k e n c e , ch. IV, 7.
' " ~ t .Thomas Aquinas, Comrnaitanj on the Metaphpics of Aristotie, trans. by J.P. Rowan, (Chicago:
Henry Regnery Co., 1961). Bk. 1, lect. 2. This work shall henceforth be referred to as In Metaph.
point another way: The Five Ways cannot be properly understood as St. Thomas
meant them if they are interpreted within the context of cosmology, but must be
interpreted as metaphysical arguments of the philosophy of being assuch.'"
In his first Surnrna St. Thomas gives us a very valuable advice for understanding
his philosophizing about God.
In order to know the things that the reason can investigate conceming God, a knowledge of
many things must already be possessed. For almost al1 philosophy is directed towards the
knowledge of God, and that is why metaphysics, which deds with divine things, is the last part
of philosophy to be Iearned. This means that we are able to a m v e at the inquiry concerning the
aforementioned truth only on the basis of a great deai of labour spent in study. Those who wish
to undergo such labour for the rnere love of knowledge are few.13'

This advice is largely ignored by interpreters and critics of the Five Ways because,
as we have seen in chapter two, they do not pay attention to the Thomistic
metaphysics required for knowing "the things reason can investigate concerning
God." W e found in their readings of St. Thomas' arguments very little or nothing
from the divine science, or the philosophy of being as such. Their view seems to be
that if we reach the First Mover, or the First Efficient Cause on the basis of motion
or efficient causality in things in the world, we have shown how St. Thomas thinks
he has reached "that which al1 men call God." But this overlooks his insistence that
knowledge of God is only attained in the context of metaphysics which for him, as
we saw in chapter three, is philosophy of being as such. The interpretations of the

"1 am aware that there is in the Thomistic scholarship a reference made to St. Thomas' proofs for
God as cosmoiogical (see Cardinal Mercier, A Manual of Modem Scholastic Philosophy). The
reference here is an attempt to distinguish St. Thomas' proofs from the ontofogicalarguments such as
Anselm's and Descartes'. The distinction is introduced to distinguish arguments that begin from
objective reality from those that begin in thought. But within the last thirty years rnuch of what
passes for a cosmological argument is philosophised about without an understanding of causality
within the context of being as being. It is within that context that St. Thomas' understanding of the
principle of causality must be viewed, and consequently his understanding of the First Cause which
al1 men call God. The data, as actualised potencies, from which this Cause is argued to must also be
seen within the context of being as being. That is why 1 propose that we view the Five Ways as
metaphysical, as within the philosophy of being as being, rather than cosmologicul.The contemporary
clirnate has, 1think, made this necessary.
13' SCG, L4.3.
three philosophers we met in chapter two are entirely bereft of any reference to the
kind of thinking St. Thomas says, in Comrnentary on the Trinity of Boethius, must be
operative in the science which deals with God, the thinking about b k g a s such.
W e cannot, then, but ask the following question: What does philosophizing about
being as such have to do with the reasoning and arguments in the Fke Ways? Unless
we can answer that, my thesis is that we cannot approach properly and read
profitably St. Thomas' demonstrations of God's existence.
It will not do to object by saying that there is no talk of being as such anywhere
in the Five Ways because St. Thomas stresses enough in his other works that
philosophical God-talk is to be metaphysical, and that metaphysical talk is of being
as such; this concerns al2 philosophical God-talk, including arguments for his
existence.
Perhaps the best way to put forth a compelling case for the claim that the Five
Ways are not an instance of the cosmological argument but five metaphysical
arguments developed in the context of the philosophy of being as such, is t o consider
some of St. Thomas' own statements regarding the first cause and its effects.
We have already encountered one of his descriptions of the first cause. In a very
early work St. Thomas says that "the first being, which is being in all its purity ... is
the first cause, or ~ o d . " ' *In his late work, Summa Theologiae, we find St. Thomas
making the same claim. "It must be that al1 things which are diversified by the
divers participation of being, so as to be more or less perfect, are caused by one First
Being, Who possesses being most perfectly."'" Doctrinally, then, St. Thomas is
consistent on this point throughout his life. The importance of this description of
the First Cause who is First Being begins to emerge as soon as we ask these
questions: To what extent are things in the world, as effects of some cause,

"Dn Benigand Essence, ch. IV, 7.

'" ST, I, q. 44, a 1.
dependent upon the cause? And what would it mean to say that they are dependent
on the cause, which as their cause cornes to be known as "first being in al1 its
purity?"13 St. Thomas explains this in a text crucial to our discussion of God as the
first cause.

Effects correspond proportionally to their causes, so that we attribute actual effects t o actual
causes, potential effects to potential causes, and similarly particular effects to particuIar causes
and universal effects to universal causes. Now the act of being is the first effect, and this is
evident by the universal presence of this act. I t foIlows that the proper cause of the act of being is
the first and u n i v e r d agent, namely God.

It seems then that effects depend o n their cause first and foremost for, what St.
Thomas calls, their act of being; not for their being moved or for moving other
beings, or for being this or that kind of a being (human, for example). But if the act
of being is the first effect,'" the first cause must be first because it is a cause of that
act first and foremost, and not because it is the cause of the act of motion, or
efficiency, etc. This first and universal proper cause St. Thomas calls God. He
further explains what he means by this dependence of effects on the cause of their
act of being by distinguishing it from another kind of dependence.

Other agents indeed are not the cause of the act of being as such, but of being this-of being a
man or being white, for example. On the contrary, the act of being, as such, is caused by creation,
which presupposes nothing; because nothing can pre-exist that is outside being as such. By
makings other than creation, this being or such being is produced; for out of pre-existent being is
made this being or such a being. I t rernains that creation is the proper action of ~ o d . ' "
So, to be caused to be is to be created, but to be produced or generated into this or
that kind of being out of pre-existent being is to be made. Effects depend on a cause
both for their being and for their being this or that kind of being. Only one cause is

'31W e have already seen that in ST,1, q. 104, a. 1, St. Thomas says that "every effect depends on its
cause, s o far as it is its cause. But we must observe that an agent [one causing another in sorne way]
may be the cause of the becoming of its effect, but not directly of its being." CIexly, then, we must
look for levels of dependence upon a cause in things that are caused.
'" In Part Two and Three of this work we shall examine in detail philosophical arguments for the
character and priority of the act of being.
'%SCG,II, 21.4.
up to the job of the former cause, and such a cause is the creator and not a mere
maker (as Geach understands the cause of the First Way).
But, we need to ask, why is there only one cause capable of being the First and
universal proper cause of the act of being? St. Thomas7answer lies in the text we
have already taken up, the early text where he says that pure being is the first cause
or God, which on this point is consistent with the Iate text in ST, 1,q. 44, a. 1.
Whatever belongs to a thing is either caused by the principles of its nature...or cornes to i t from
an extrinsic principle... Now being itself cannot be caused by the form or quiddity of a thing (by
'caused' I mean an efficient cause), because that thing would then be its own cause a d it would
bring itself into being, which is impossible. It follows that everything whose being is distinct
from its nature must have being from another. And because everything that exists through
another is reduced to that which exists through itself as to its first cause, there must be a reality
that is the cause of al1 other things because it is pure being. If this were not so, we would go on to
infinity in causes, for everything that is not pure being has a cause of its being.13

The reason, then, why only one cause is the first and proper cause of the act of being
is that it differs from everything else with respect to the act of being, and this we
know because everything else is not identically the act of being (for if, for example,
to be a human being and t o be were identical, only human beings would be, which is
against the fact) and as such it must have that act by reception, or caused.'"

Beingand Essence, ch. IV, 7. See also ST, 1, q. 3, a. 4. Some Thomist scholars think this passage
in On Being and Essence constitutes one of St, Thomas' demonstrations for God's existence, others
disagree. What, in my judgment, stands in the way of Our regarding it as a formal demonstration is
first of al1 its absence in two main places where St. Thomas clearly offers a collection of arguments for
God's existence (SCG, 1, 13 & ST,1, q. 2, a. 3). Secondly, in this work St. Thomas does not explicitly
offer this text as a demonstration of God; if he does not so offer it, we need not so take it. But he does
offer the text as the context in which such a demonstration operates. It tells us how t o view God as
the first cause, and creatures as his effects. For that reason this is an indispensable text for
establishing a proper context of the Five Ways,
' " ~ t . Thomas rnakes the sarne point in his later Summa in a text we already took up. "If the existence
of a thing differs from its essence [as it does in al1 creatures], this existence must be caused either by
some exterior agent or by its essential principles. Now i t is impossible for a thing's existence to be
caused by its essential constituent principles, for nothing can be the sufficient cause of its own
existence, if its existence is caused. Therefore, that thing whose existence differs from its essence,
must have its existence caused by another. But this cannot be t m e of Cod; because we cal1 God the
first efficient cause. Therefore, it is impossible that in God His existence should differ from His
essence." ST, 1, q. 44, a. 1. Again, this is no more a forma1 proof of God's existence than the text in On
Being and Essence, IV, 7, but it is just as much an indication of the proper context for a formal proof,
 Here we have a clear indication of what St. Thomas means by first when he calls
God the First Cause. At the beginning of his first Sumrna (1, 1) we find another
indication "First philosophy is the science of truth, not of any truth, but of that
truth which is the origin of al1 truth, namely, which belongs to the first principle
whereby al1 things are. The truth belonging to such a principle is, clearly, the source
of al1 truth; for things have the sarne disposition in truth as in being." Thus we may
Say that the first or highest cause means the cause of that in virtue of which an
actual being is ultimately actual-is ultimately caused to be; it means "the first
principle whereby al1 things are."
Therefore, a proper understanding of St. Thomas' philosophizing about God or
of the highest cause must include an understanding of what, for him, in the final
analysis makes an actual thing actual or what makes a being be. This, St. Thomas
says, in a middle text, is being. "Being is the highest perfection of all. Being is the
actuality of al1 acts, and therefore the perfection of al1 perfections."'" It is only when
we have understood what he means by being that we can make sense of his inquiry
-into the first or highest cause of the being of things, or the proper cause of their act
of being. And that is why St. Thomas says that much knowledge gained by a great
deal of effort is required to begin philosophizing about God. The Five Ways are five
different demonstrations of the first cause of the act of being. Therefore, the context
of the Fiue Ways is that of a philosophical adiuity in iwhich one tries to reach the
ultimate cause in an actual thing of that reihich u h a t e l y makes it actual or giues it
actuality, which is its act of being. We shall begin to look in this direction only if we
consider the effects of the first cause with respect to their most central need of being

chat is, it telis us something about the data of the Five Ways and their dependence on the First
Cause, and about the irrelevance of an infinite regress.
139
De Pot., q. VII, a. 2, ad 9.
caused-what primarily makes them an effect, an actual something. This, St. Thomas
tells us, is their act of being.
What are some alternative ways of looking at the effects of the first cause; where
other than in their act of being can we look for the center of their dependence on the
first cause? In chapter two we saw three possibilities: Copleston looks for it in their
efficiency (in their power to move something else) and the external conditions
required for exercising the power of efficiency; Geach looks for it in their being
changed or moved; and Kenny looks for it in their being generable (in their matter
having the capacity to receive another form). Al1 these fail to distinguish between a
thing's dependence on a cause for its act of being and various other kinds of
dependence, a distinction which we have seen St. Thomas make.'" We shall fail to
make this distinction whenever we fail to distinguish between being as mobile and
being as such. But St. Thomas insists that we make this distinction when he says
that "the movable does not owe its being to its mover, but only its movernent," or
"the movable does not depend on the mover for its being, but only for its being
moved." 14*
Clearly, then, the proper cause of the act of being, the First Cause which al1 men
cal1 God, is not the first as the cause of being as mobile but as the cause of being as
such. But if the First Cause is understood only as the cause of the change or

movement in another, the effect is dependent on the First Cause only for the
movement and only a t the interval in which it receives the movernent, and such a
First Cause is inoperative when the thing is not being moved. Remember the
Aristotelian definition of motion we encountered in chapter three: "the actuality of

140
See De Pot., q. III, a. 5;SCG, II, 52; ST, 1, q. 44, a. 2; 1, q. 45, a. 4, ad 1and 2; 1, q. 104, a. 1.
"' SCG,II, 57, 11&12. In SCG.III, 65, 5 St. Thomas says that "though motion may occur for any
existing thing, motion is apart from the being of the thing."
that which exists potentially when it is in actuality not as itself but as movable."lQ
Clearly, the First Mover understood only as the cause of motion in a being is not a
cause of its actuality as itself, but only insofar as i t moves. Thus if water moves from
cold to hot, it is dependent on the cause of that motion only during the change from
cold to hot, but not when it is cold nor when it is hot, nor even for being water, and
certainly not for being a being, which, for St. Thomas, water is before it is anything
else. A dependence on such a first cause is not a dependence on that which al1 men
cal1 God. But no matter how elaborate Our understanding of being as mobile and of
its dependence on a cause may be, we shall never find in that understanding its need
for the First Cause by which al1 men mean God unless we see its dependence for
being, and we shall never see a dependence for being except by doing metaphysics or
the science of being a s being. The extent to which we have seen, in chapter three, St.
Thomas makes the distinction between philosophy of nature and metaphysics is too
clear and elaborate not to be employed in an interpretation of his philosophizing
about God.
Furthermore, St. Thomas distinguishes between cosmology and metaphysics by
different degrees of abstraction, and by saying that in the former we engage in
rational thinking and in the latter in intellectual thinking. He points out "that
rational thinking ends in intellectual thinking," and that "al1 rational thinking in al1
the sciences... terminates in the knowledge of divine science."la This means that the
thinking and conclusions of cosmology, which is thinking about being as mobile
corne to their fruition in metaphysics or the thinking about being as such. If, then, by
way of cosmology we arrive a t the Unmoved Mover and the First Efficient Cause as
the cause of being as mobile, we must bring it up into metaphysics and see it as a
truly first cause, as a cause of being as being. Only that way shall we reach God as

loAristotle, Ph@, III, 1,201a 10-16, tram. by H.G. Apostle.

la ~ i v ~ n and
o n Methods ojthe Sciences, q. VI, a. 1,ed. cit.
the proper cause of the act of being, as the cause of being pure and simple. In other
words, we must see the Five Ways not as rational demonstrations, as belonging to
cosmology, but as intellectual demonstrations operating in light of the principles
which anse from being pure and simple.
But to engage in intellectual, metaphysicai thinking in Our interpretation of the
Five Ways we shall have to view the data, the effects, as bearers of the act of being
first and foremost. We shall have to engage in a higher degree of abstraction than is
operative in cosmology and the study of being as mobile. Given that cosmology and
metaphysics "are differentiated according to their degree of separation from matter
and motion,"lMthe data of the Five Ways must be viewed metaphysically, which is
to Say in a higher degree of separation from matter and motion. Anthony Kenny
finds this puzzling. I n his interpretation of the First Way he considers the
possibility that the first premise of the argument ("It is certain, and evident to our
senses, that in the world some things are in motion.") may be looked a t
metaphysically. When told by Joseph Owens that a metaphysical consideration of
that premise must be done "ultimately in terms of the existential act [the act of
being],"'" Kenny replies in the following way. "The texts [Owens] quotes from St.
Thomas do not seem to support the nonsensical view that when you have explained
a particular motion at a particular time you have to explain also the occurrence of
that moti~n.'""~
Kenny misses the point entirely. To Say that we have explained a particular
motion a t a particular time is to Say, in the Thomistic context, that we have as
cosmologists said something about being as mobile. W e have been natural scientists
engaged in what St. Thomas calls rational thinking which operates in light of the

14.4
Ibid.q. V,a. 1.
'" ~ o s e Owens,
~h St.Thomas on the Ekktence of God,p. 166.
Kenny, op. cit,p. 11, n. 1. Ernphasis mine.
principles of motion we discussed in chapter three. But as metaphysicians, as
philosophers of the divine science, we also want to explain the bentg of that mhich
moues (of being as mobile) because its act of being is its first effect, pnor even to its
motion. It is not nonsensical to look for the cause of the act of being of a moving
thing, because "the movable does not depend on the mover for its being, but only for
its being r n o ~ e d . " Kenny
'~ completely misconstrues Owens when, by the act of
being of a moving thing, he takes him "to mean the actual occurrence of a motion ...
[as] something different from the motion o ~ c u r r i n g . " That
' ~ a thing is moved, or
that its motion occurs upon the action of a cause is one thing, but that a being which
is moved also exists as moving is another and very different matter which also,
according to St. Thomas, requires a cause. Because Kenny commits himself hom the
outset to an exclusively cosmological reading of the Five Ways, a reading a t the
level of being as mobile, he is unable to understand the meaning of the First Cause as
the proper cause of the act of being. It is no wonder, then, that he finds St. Thomas
failing to dernonstrate God's existence. He looks in the direction where St. Thomas
does not place his arguments.
In one of St. Thomas' less studied works he tells us how we are to understand the
effects on the basis of which we can know that God exists. It is "through causality.
For sensible creatures are imperfect and changeable, they must be reduced to some
unchangeable and perfect principle. And from this we know that God exists." '" Now
what is that unchangeable and perfect principle to which sensible creatures, the
data of the Five Ways, must be reduced in order that through causality we rnay
know that God exists? That principle must be their being, which, according to St.

14
SCG, II, 57,11& 12.
'" Kenny, ibid.
'" S t . Thomas Aquinas, in Epistolarn ad Romanos 1, lect. 6 (in Divinons and Methods of the Sciences,
ed-cit.,p.87,n.27.)
Thomas, is "the highest perfection of all, the actuality of al1 acts, and therefore the
perfection of al1 perfections."'50We rnust see the data of the Five Ways as beings, or
existents, because St. Thomas tells us to.
It need not puzzle us that nowhere in the Five Ways St. Thomas explicitly
mentions the act of being. He does not need to if we are well acquainted with his
Cornrnentary on the Trinity of Boethius and On Being and Essence. The Five Ways
corne after "a knowledge of many things already possessed..., and only on the basis of
a great deal of labour spent in ~ t u d ~ .St.
" ' Thomas,
~~ knowing that in the Five Ways
he is doing metaphysics and that his readers, who were primarily magistn of Sacred
Theology, know that t o be sol simply assumes the pre-requisite knowledge of
philosophy of being a s such and argues for the first cause of the act of being from the
sensible creatures, accessible to us by experience, viewed as bearers of the act of
being which is not part of their nature and must therefore be owed to an extrinsic
cause. St. Thomas' employment of actuality, potentiality, came, impossibility of
infinite regress, is to be understood as belonging to the science of the highest degree
of abstraction from matter and motion which is the philosophy of being as such. If, in
looking at the data of the Five Ways, we lose sight of them as things whose first and
most universal effect is the act of being, we shall not find our way to that which al1
men cal1 God, but shall, by way of rational rather than intellectual thinking, get
tangled up in the First Cause of motion, efficiency, generation, order, etc. It will
then be impossible to see how, in St. Thomas' mind, al1 these different causes are the
same God; we shall not see what al1 these causes have in common which earns them
the title "that which al1 men cal1 God."

'"De Pot.,q. VII.a.2, ad9.

151
SCG, 1,4, 3. The reason why it must be metaphysical study, a great deal of which is required for
philosophizing about God, is that we need to see things in the worId as possessing an act of being as
separate from al1 its other acts. Only after seeing it can we ask about its proper cause. Therefore,
philosophizing about God comes on the heels of much metaphysical inquiry, which itself comes on
the heels of much cosmological inquiry.
 Thus, in order to understand the data of the First Way, for example, in a way
that will lead to God as the proper cause of the act of being, we must see the data as
beings first and foremost, but also, and in fact inseparablytg so, as beings that
acquired an additional factor (in this case it is motion or change of some sort) and
which exist as qualified by that additional factor. Recail St. Thomas' claim "that
mobile being, with which the philosophy of nature deals, ADDS to being pure and
simple, with which rnetaphysics is c ~ n c e r n e d . "In
' ~ a much earlier text St. Thomas
says: "Things are not distinguished from one another in having being, for in this
they agree... Things differ because they have diverse natures, to which being accmes
in a diverse way."'" This addition, dealt with by natural philosophy, to which being
accrues so affects the sensible being of our data that its way of being is as qualifed
by motion o r change. Because this is so, the proper cause of the act of being
reasoned to in the First Way rnust be the proper cause of the act of being of that
being which exists as qualified by motion or change, as having acquired this o r that
addition. Hence the First Mover. But this is the First Mover not only of the
acquired qualification of the being in question in the First Way,lsi but also of its
being which is its first and most universal dependence on a cause. If we do not note
well this twofold dependence on a cause, the God to which we shall arrive a t the end
of the First Way will not be more of a God than an Unchanged Changer responsible
only for the changes going on in changing beings, and Ieaving untouched their
dependence for their act of being.

152
But the data is separable by the intellect operating a t the third level of abstraction, which, in the
Cornmentary on the Trinity of Boethius, St. Thomas caIls separation. See chapter three above.
lD~nIMetaph..lect.2,ed.cit.. p. 20.
SCG. 1.26.3.
'" One could arrive at such a First Mover only by way of the first degree of abstraction which
operates in the realm of being as mobiZe and not in the realm of the divine science where God cornes
to be known philosophically.
 Furthermore, it will be impossible to connect such a God to the cause of the
Third Way, for exampie. There the data are beings that do not acquire this or that
additional factor of being, like motion, efficiency and order, but acquire the act itself
of being, and we know that they do acquire it because we see them going in and out
of being. This is not the most manifest of Ways because t o see a being existing as
having acquired the act of being requires a more penetrating metaphysical reflection
than to see it as having acquired the act of changing, and so its place is in the middle
of the Five Ways. But, as 1 shall show in chapter eleven, here the cause to which Our
intellect arrives is immediately the proper cause of the act of being, and not the
proper cause of the act of being of a being existing as qualified by some addition
dealt with by the philosophy of nature. The cause of both the First and Third Ways
will be seen to be what St. Thomas calls the proper cause of the act of being, and
which al1 men cal1 God, only if we understand the data of each of them as we have
just described it. That we must see the data that way is clear as soon as we take
seriously St. Thomas' insistence that philosophical God-talk, with al1 its related
terminology first met in philosophy of nature and then elevated to a higher level of
abstraction, must take place within the context of metaphysics or philosophy of
being as such. We shall have to inquire into St. Thomas' metaphysics enough to be
able to begin seeing the data in the way just described and to understand it that
way. Parts two and three of this work are intended for that purpose.

The CosmologicalArgument
I suggest that what stands in our way of reading and interpreting the Five Ways
within the context of philosophy of being as such is our modern understanding of
the so catled cosmological argument. It is true t h a t there is not only one
undentanding of the cosmological argument, but 1 maintain that al1 versions of it
whether they issue from Leibniz, Wolf, or Samuel Clarke, are a serious impediment
to reading profitably and interpreting correctly the Five Ways if their context is
imposed on the Five Ways. The reason is that in the cosmological argument, of any
version nowadays entertained, t h e First Cause reasoned to is never seen nor
mentioned as the cause of, what St. Thomas calls, the act of being. The reason why it
is not so seen is that the effect of the First Cause of any version of the cosmological
argument, or the data from which one reasons to the First Cause, is dways gathered
only by the kind of thinking operative in cosmology which has as its proper object,
what St. Thomas calls, mobile being. AH of the characteristics of mobile being are
discovered and reasoned about by the thinking process St. Thomas calls "first
degree of abstraction" from matter and motion. Beings considered by the mind
operating at this degree of abstraction can only be conceived as dependent upon a
cause for sorne qualification and factor of being like motion, efficiency, order, etc.,
but not for that act which St. Thomas calls "the highest perfection of all, the
actuality of al1 acts." In other words, unless we see the data of the Five Ways as
requiring a cause of their being (esse) which is their proper act,lS we will not
understand properly the context of St. Thomas' arguments for God's existence.
The cosmological argument is sometimes referred to as an a posteriori argument
because i t is based on a prernise that can be known through experience of the world.
What is said to be experienced is the world as consisting in things that are caused to
exist. So far that sounds very much like St. Thomas. But we must be v e r y careful
here to ask: 1s the cause of them conceived as of that which we primarily see as
rnoving or changing or of that which is first and foremost a being existing as having
acquired or as acquiring some additional factor or qualification? Our answer
depends on how we are viewing them. If we are viewing them as philosophers of
being as being, we shall be on the same wavelength with St. Thomas; if we are not,

SCG, II, 54.3, and n. 118, p. 55 above.

we shall rnisconstrue his argument in a variety of ways, most of which will betray
Our thinking as operating merely at the level of cosmology.
Consider William Rowe, a contemporary philosopher of religion who has
published much on the cosmological argument. He says that "Aquinas put forth five
distinct arguments for the existence of God, and of these, the fint three are versions
of Cosmological Argument."" What the other two are Rowe does not Say, but by
seeing the first three Ways as different from the Fourth and the Fifth he obviously
regards the kind of thinking St. Thomas is engaged in the Five Ways as in some way
fragmented. Here is how Rowe, operating within the context of the cosmological
argument, understands St. Thomas' reasoning. He thinks that in the First and the
Second Way St. Thomas

started from the fact that there are things in the world undergoing change and reasoned to the
conclusion that there must be some ultimate cause of change that is itself unchanging. In the
second he started frorn the fact that there are things in the world that clearly are caused to exist
by other things and reasoned to the conclusion that there must be some ultimate cause of
existence whose own existence is itself ~ n c a u s e d . ' ~

Rowe disagrees with Kenny and sees the data of the Third Way not as alterable
things Ieading to the unalterable cause, but as things which need not have existed at
al1 but nevertheless do, and as such need a cause that exists in a way that it could
not fail to do so.
Rowe's understanding of St. Thomas' reasoning in the first bvo Ways is a good
example of regarding the caused data only as changing things, because he reads St.
Thomas as looking for "some ultimate cause of change."'"~e fails to distinguish, as

15'
William Rowe, Philosophy of Religion, p. 17.
'% ~bid.
' " ~ h a t we ought not so regard the data or the effects of the proper cause of the act of being is clear
from St. Thomas' following point. "Accidents and forms and the like non-subsisting things are to be
said to CO-existrather than to exist, so they ought to be called rather concreated than created things;
whereas, properly speaking, created things are subsistent beings." ST, 1, q. 45, a. 4. In other words, the
cause of the existence of things is not simply the cause of things as changing, or as having this or that
characteristic, but of the cause of things as beings or existent..
St. Thomas does, between the cosmological study of being as mobile and the
metaphysical one of being as such. In saying that St. Thomas' ultimate o r first cause
is a cause only of change, he misses St. Thomas' insistence that "the movable does
not depend on the mover for its being, but only for its being moved."lm In other
words, he does not see that for St. Thomas the First Cause is first because it is the
cause of the first and most universal effect which is the act of being. For that reason
he reads St. Thomas in the Second Way as thinking that "there are things in the
world that clearly are caused to exist by other things." But St. Thomas rnakes no
such claim in the Second Way. We have pointed out above texts16' which show that,
for him, a creature is incapable of directly making something t o be, of giving
something the act of being. If we fail to note this, we shall not be able to understand
the data of the Second Way as St. Thomas offers it, and consequently not be able to
see how he understands the First Cause of that data. Here again we must get out of
that mode of thinking which is proper to cosmology and its consideration of being
not yet highly enough abstracted from matter and motion to enable us to see it as
belonging to al1 things, whether material or irnmaterial, and as separate from this or
that qualification of it.
It follows that al1 of the modern and contemporary criticisms of the cosmological
argument leveled at the Five Ways are misdirected, and as such only get in the way
of our trying to understand St. Thomas' arguments. Such criticisms, stemming from
an inadequate distinction between Thomistic cosmology and metaphysics, only
cloud our view of St. Thomas' reasoning and steer us in the direction in which we
shall never be able to see why he thinks he has successhlly reasoned to that which
al1 men cal1 God.

' B D ~ 11,57,11&12.
~ ~ ,
161
De Pot., q. III, a. 5; q. VII, a. 2; ST, 1, q. 44, a. 2; 1, q. 45, a- 4 , ad I and 2; 1, q. 104, a. 1.
 But even though we may have been misdirected by the cosmological tradition of
looking at the Five Ways, we are given advice to look at them differently by
formidable scholars of St. Thomas. We cannot, in al1 intellectual honesty, which is
indispensable for learning, ignore their advice. One such piece of advice, which 1
find very compelling, comes from Martin Grabmann.
The metaphysics of St. Thomas is not merely an arrangement of ideas, but stands in living
relationship with reality. It is a basic conviction of his philosophy that the human mind, chiefly
by abstraction, then also by intuition and in ference, is able to discover being and the I a w and
relations of being in experienced reality. It can perceive an agreement between the laws of being
and the structure of the mind, the ratio in both a subjective and objective sense, which has its
ultimate foundation in God, the First Cause of being and thought.
The supreme Iaws of being in their transcendent vaiidity, surpassing the limits of Empiricism,
are similar t o unshakable pillars upon which Our knowledge of causes lays the bridge to a
knowledge of God. The metaphysical doctrine of potency and act, of the real distinction between
essence and existence in creatures, helps to bring out clearly and preciseIy, in the Thomistic
system, the basic distinction between God and the world, the transcendence of God over the
world. On the other hand, careful reflection upon the universal divine causality, embracing the
innermost being and activity of creatures, gives a profound understanding of the immanence of
God in the world ...
[From this foIlows an al1 important consequence.] One will never thoroughly understand the
philosophy or the theology of the Angelic Doctor, nor be able to penetrate to the depths of his
supernatural consideration of God and the universe, unless he has devoted himself through
ceaseless study to the metaphysical concepts of his works.LGL
In a line, Grabrnann's advice is this: If we wish to study fmitfully the writings of
St. Thomas, we cannot escape his philosophy of being, specially so if we wish to
study his arguments for God's existence. A life-long effort spent in this study is well
worth the trouble because one of the payoffs of reaching God with one's intellect is
the ability to refute intellectual attacks, either in the many forms of skepticism,
sophisticated relativism, or materialism, against daims to knowledge that God is
real.
Another advice comes from James Collins whose authority, in this particular
work, is not that of a Thomistic scholar but of one who has thoroughly studied

Martin Grabmann, The Interior Life of SC.Thomas Aquinas. (Milwaukee: The Bruce Publishing
Co., 1951). pp. 22-26. Grabmann began his work and reached his conclusions before and
independently of other well known scholars of St. Thomas like Etienne Gilson, Jacques Maritain,
Joseph Owens, and Anton Pegis.
modem philosophy and its many positions on God, and concluded that the best and
the only way to reach the truth of God's existence philosophically is through St.
Thomas' metaphysics. He describes that way in his monumental God in Modenz
Philosophy .
The causal demonstration of the truth of God's existence is not grounded upon the analytic
necessity of relation in logic or mathematics but upon a causal necessity found to be required for
an actud, sensible existent within our experience ... The proposition which gives meaning and
validity to our philosophica1 conception of God ultimately gets its causal foundation and
inferential warrant from our analysis of composite, sensible beings. There is no more radically
determinate and relevant a basis for assent than this one, since the inference is made and t h e
assent given to God as a consequence of inspecting some given sensible things in their composing
prnciples of being ... A humanly developed philosophy of God must examine the structure of t h e
existing sensible thing of our experience, discover its intrinsic composition and causal
dependence in being for its concrete act of existing, and in this way infer the truth of t h e
proposition that there exists a first, purely actual cause of this being.lm

If we heed this advice of such formidable scholars, and are driven by the desire to
learn, we shall find it impossible to avoid engaging in a life-long study of St.
Thomas' philosophy of being as being. We shall also find it impossible to understand
al1 his philosophizing about God apart from his metaphysics, including his
arguments for God's existence.

The Theological Character of the Fiue W u y s

It is al1 too easy to forget that St. Thomas' arguments for God corne in two
theological works: Summa Contra Gentiles and Summa Theologiae. St. Thomas is a
theologian, a theologian who also philosophises. His main interest is not the truth of
metaphysics, but of the Catholic faith. The works in which he puts his forma1
arguments for God are works of Sacra Doctrina, not textbooks in rnetaphysics.lM
When putting forth arguments for God, St. Thomas is expounding Holy Christian
teachings. Therefore, as a theologian he is interested in demonstrating God who
resembles as closely as possible the God of Holy Christian teachings.
-

Ia~arnesCollins, Godin Modem Philosophy. pp. 387,394,399.

la But many of St. Thomas' metaphysical insights are interspersed throughout the two Surnmae.
 What is the God of the Christian teachings? In speaking of God as the first
agent, or the first efficient cause, St. Thomas describes Him philosophically as being
itself, which allows hirn to conclude that he has been describing the God of Judeo-
Christian teachings: "Wherefore in Exodus (3:14) the proper name of God is stated
to be 'HE WHO IS,' because it is proper to Him alone that His substance is not other
than His being."'65Having concluded that it is proper only to God to have His
substance identical with His being, and this on the basis of considering the act of
being of things other than God and its distinction in them from their essence and
St. Thomas reaches with his intellect the same God in Whom he
every other act,lBS
puts his faith. In other words, the act of being of creatures is such that it requires a
cause, and this cause is such that i t can be said of it what Moses says of it: His name
is 'HE WHO 1s'. Reaching the God who fittingly bears this name is St. Thomas'
primary goal in demonstrating God; he wants his arguments to reach as closely as
possible the God of Sacra Doctrina. We must, therefore, view the arguments in this
light.
In Surnma Theologiae St. Thomas prefaces his Five Ways by saying, "It is said in
the person of God [God says of Hirnselfl:I a m Who am (Exodus 3:14). The existence
of God can be proved in five ways." Which God? The one whose name is I AM WHO
AM. As a teacher of Holy Christian teachings St. Thomas has his eye on the God of
his Holy Scriptures. We must then see his arguments as conducive to seeing the

'=SCG, II, 52.9. In this passage St. Thomas rnakes reference to his earlier argument for God in I,13.
Clearly, for hirn, the God reached in those arguments is the Christian God whose name is "1 AM."
'66~f. SCGl 1, 22, 9 & 10: ''Every thing exists because it has being. A thing whose essence is not its
being, consequently, is not through its essence but by participation in something, narnely, being
itself. But that which is through participation in something cannot be the first being, because prior to
it is the being in which it participates in order to be. But God is the first being, with nothing pnor to
Him. His essence is, therefore, His being.
This sublime truth Moses was taught by Our Lord [Who said]: "1 AM WHO AM ... Thou shalt
Say to the children of Israel: He who is hath sent me to you" (Exod. 3:13, 14). By this Our Lord
showed that His own proper name is HE WHO IS. Now, names have been devised to signib the
nature or essences of things, It remains, then, that the divine being is God's essence or nature."
God of Sacra ~ o c t n k a ,who,
' ~ speaking both philosophically and theologically, is

Being Itself, Ipsurn Esse Subsistens, 1 AM.

When later in Q. 8, art. 1, St. Thomas considers whether this God who is Being
Itself is in al1 things, he again makes theological use of his philosophizing about God.
As his starting point for affirming that God is in al1 things he uses a quote from the
prophet Isaiah: "Lord, You have completed a11 our works in US."'^ St. Thomas
knows by faith that al1 our works are God's doing; he knows that it is God who acts
whenever we act, that God is the agent when we are agents (this is what rnakes God
the First Agent).
In the body of the article this t m t h can be seen philosophically as well. St.
Thomas knows from Aristotle, "that the thing moved and the mover must be joined
together." But what is for St. Thomas the deepest source of the First Agent's
presence in His effects, which are themselves agents? Another way to put the
question: what makes us agents? The answer: that which gives us actuality-"being
(esse) is innermost in each thing and most fundamentally inherent in al1 things since
it is forma1 in respect of everything found in a thing." But because God is Being
Itself, "created being must be His proper effect." God, therefore, is the proper cause
of our existing, and as such present t o us as existing and constantly conserving us
deeply and intimately because our act of existing is the source of al1 our reality

167
For God is the object of the science of Sacra Doctrina (see ST, 1, q. 1, a. 7). The first t a k , then, of a
theological work like Surnrna Theologiae will be to demonstrate God's existence. This demonstration
has the following character: "Although we cannot know in what consists the essence of God,
nevertheless in this science we make use of His effects, either of nature or of grace, in place of a
definition, in regard to whatever is treated of in this science concerning God; even as in some
philosophical sciences we demonstrate something about a cause frorn its effect, by taking the effect in
place of a definition of the cause." (ST.,1, 1, 7,ad 1) This is precisely what we shall do in the first
section ofchapter ten.
Isaiah 26:12. The verse appears in the Sumrna as "Omnia opera nostra operatus es in nobis,
Domine." The Vulgate omit. "innand reads, "omnia enim opera nostra operatus es nobis," which may
be translated as "You completed al1 our works for us." But it is more to St. Thomas' point to Say that
God cornpletes al1 our works in us.
(including Our actions); Our act of existing, St. Thomas has already pointed out (Q.
3, art. 5), is that which makes Our form or nature actual; and this rnakes al1 other
acts (including motion and efficiency), in relation to the act of existing, only
potencies.
We have good reason, then, to interpret the Five Ways keeping a close eye on
the affinity between the First Mover or Agent and HE WHO IS. What will allow us
to do this is a good understanding of the First Mover as Being Itself, and this means
that we must engage in a thoroughly rnetaphysical interpretation of the Five Ways,
which is the advice of scholars like Martin Grabmann and many others.

A Reply to an Objection
In spite of the textual evidence we have put forth in this chapter in support of
the claim that St. Thomas' arguments for God must be seen in their entirety as
metaphysical, there are scholars who maintain that a partly physical interpretation
of St. Thomas' arguments is possible. The arguments which they find easiest to
interpret this way are those of the First and Second Way. Many interpreters in fact
see the first two Ways as more or less the same; they see them as arguing for the first
efficient cause of motion, or the Unmoved Mover, and for the first efficient cause, or
the Uncaused Cause. In other words, the premises and the inferences in t h e first two
Ways are seen as established through the kind of thinking operative in cosmology;
the principle "whatever is moved is moved by another" is regarded as cosmological .

rather than metaphysical. It is only at the point of the conclusion of t h e first two
Ways that we plug in metaphysics, that is, once we have reached the Unmoved
Mover and the Uncaused Cause we then proceed to argue for i t as the being that is
identically its existence (Ipsum Esse Subsistens). In other words, metaphysical
thinking operates on the ultimate cause, not on the data from which we argued to
the ultimate cause; the data is to be understood cosmologically. Thus i n the First
Way, for example, the Unmoved Mover is the absolute principle of motion, not the
absolute principle of being.
In my view there is nothing objectionable about seeing the first two Ways as
arguing for the nmoved Mover and the Uncaused Cause cosmologically. It is
certainly a possible and a plausible reading. "Whatever is moved is moved by
another" is certainly a principle of physics and can serve to reach the Unmoved
Mover. But 1 do not think that this is how St. Thomas is intending the first two
Ways. 1 think he is employing "whatever is moved is moved by another" as a
metaphysician, and this in order to reach not only the Unmoved Mover of
Aristotle's Physics and Metaphysics, but also the God of the Christian Scriptures
whose name is I AM. Recall that the Five Ways are given in a theological work.
My best line of defense, 1 think, is to show why we must read St. Thomas as
employing "whatever is moved is moved by another" metaphysically if we are to
understand how he argues for the existence of the God of Christian theology.
In the above mentioned objection it is suggested that St. Thomas is arguing for
the Unmoved Mover understood as the absolute principle of motion,and that from
there he later goes on t o argue for the First Cause of Being. But the fact of the
matter is that he does not do so. Before 1 address this more hlly, I want to say
sornething about St. Thomas' understanding of motion and the bearing that
understanding has on the principle "whatever is moved is moved by another."
St. Thomas defines motion this way.
Motion is neither the potency of that which exists in potency, nor the act of that which exists in
act. Rather motion is the act of that which exists in potency, such that its ordination to its prior
potency is designated t o what is called 'act', and its ordination to hrther acc is designated by
what is called 'existing in potency'. Hence, the Philosopher has defined motion most adequately
by sa -ng that motion-is the enteechy, ive.,the act of that which exists in potency insofar as it is
such.G

' @ ~ tThomas
. Aquinas, In III Phys., k t . 2, n. 285.
 According to this understanding of motion, any case of it is a transition between
two terms: potency ('can') and act ('is'); it is a process of actualizing a potency
present in a being ("motion is nothing else than the reduction of something from
potentiality to a c t u d i t y " ' ~ .Now the act of actualizing a potency in a being cannot
be performed by the being in potency, for in that case it would have t o give itself the
act which it does not have ("nothing can be reduced from potentiality to actuality,
In other words, a "can-ben never
except by something in a state of a~tuality"'~').
cornes to be an "is" on its own strength, because it does not have it. If a potency were
self-actualizing it would not be a potency. Hence the maxim: "whatever is moved is
moved by another." This means that whatever is reduced from potency t o act
(whatever undergoes some motion or change) does so only by the agency of
something which exists in act. This is crucial, because in light of it the argument
from motion in the First Way is an argument in which motion is understood as a
reduction from beingpotentially (from that which exists as potential, as able to be in
a way other than it is at present) to being actually (to that which exists here and
now in a way it was earlier only able to be). The argument is from beings
undergoing some motion, that is, beings which possess the "can" of that motion but
require the agency of something which exists in act t o bring them into the "is" of
that motion. But, a proponent of the objection mentioned above will Say, Why must
you bring in here the talk of being why must t h e reasoning proceed along
metaphysical lines? W e must because motion is here understood as a reduction from
being potentiall' to being actually by that which is actually. Now that which here
exists in act, and which reduces a being from potency t o act (which moves it) is an
agent or an efficient cause. "But it belongs t o everything to have an efficient

'"sT, 1, q. 2, a. 3, the First Way.

17' Ibid.
(agentem) cause, inasmuch as it has being (esse)."" Thus what the Unmoved
Mover is responsible for, in St. Thomas' argument in the First Way, is the very
existence (be-ing) of that which exists as undergoing some motion, as crossing from
potency to act. St. Thomas' efficient cause goes al1 the way to the very be-ing of that
which it causes. This is why, in the Thomistic context, "whatever is moved is moved
by another" is a metaphysical principle."

' n ~1, q.~44,, a. 1, ad 3. For St. Thomas the efficient cause must, therefore, be defined as that which
bestows being (esse) whenever it bestows anything. But, Joseph Owens points out, "In Aristotle.
efficient cause was regularly defined in terms of motion. I t was understood as the cause that
originated motion [see Physics, II. 31." An Elmientay Christian Metaphysics, (Houston: Center for
Thomistic Studies, 1985), p. 73. n. 12. For St. Thomas motion means every and al1 transition from
potency to act; this includes every transition from non-being to being.
That for St. Thomas the activity of the efficient cause must be understood in terms of the act of
being is clear hom the following text. "Since every agent acts so far as it is in act, it belongs t o the
first agent, which is most perfect, to be most perfectly in act. Now, a thing is more perfectly in act the
more its act is posterior in the way of generation, for act is posterior in time to potentiality in one and
the same thing that passes from potentiality to act [the one that undergoes some motion]. Further,
act itself is more perfectly in act than that which has act, since the latter is in act because of the
former. [How do we know that the latter is in act because of the former? St. Thomas refers us back to
his argument in SCG, 1, 13. The argument must therefore be read as an argument for the cause which
bestows on its effects this the most perfect of acts.] These things having been posited, it is clear from
what has been shown in Book 1 of this work [ch. 131 that God atone is the first agent. Therefore, it
belongs to Him alone to be in act in the most perfect way, that is to be Himself the most perfect act.
Now, this act is being, wherein generation and ail movement terminate, since every form and act is in
potentiality before it acquires being." (SCG, II, 52,7) CIearly, then, for St. Thomas a consideration of
generation and motion is inextricably tied up with the act of being. Motion in St. Thomas receives a
metaphysica! treatment because it is understood as a reduction from being potentially t o being

ln
Note aiso the following teat: "In a third sense cause means that from which the fkst beginning of
change or of rest cornes, Le., a moving or efficient cause.... To this genus of cause is reduced
everything that makes anything to be in any manner whatsoever, not only as regards substantial
being, but also as regards accidental being, which occurs in every kind of motion." In V Metaph, lect.
2, nos. 765 and 770. Note that St. Thomas is here equating, in the way that Aristotle does not, the
moving and the efficient cause as ultimately causing something CO be. This is not to Say that
efficiency is creation; that parents, for example, produce in their offspring its actual esse. Recail the
text from De Pot., q. VIT, a. 2 we quoted in Our discussion of Geach in ch. 2: "There must be a cause
higher than al1 the causes, a cause because of which they themselves cause being, and of which being
is the proper effect. This cause is God." Creation, Etienne Gilson points out, "is the prototype of
causal efficiency, and if they are t o be conceived as contributing to the very being of their effects,
finite beings are efficient causes only inasmuch as, in acting, they imitate the first efficient act, cause
of al1 other beings as well as of their causal fecundity." (Elements of Christian Philosophy, Garden
City, NY,1960, pp. 189-190)
 For even if we reach the Unmoved Mover as the absolute principle of motion,
and then wsh t o "unpack the Unmoved Mover so as t o see that he is really Ipsum
Esse Subsistm, or First Being, will we not have to make recourse again in our quest
for Ipsurn Esse Subsistas (First Being), as "proper cause of the act of being", to the
effects of this proper cause? The road to this cause is still through its effects, not
through an understanding of it as the Unmoved Mover. Nowhere does St. Thomas
speak of God as the proper cause of the act of being in the context of an already
established absolute principle of motion. When in De Ente et Essentia IV, 7 St.
Thomas argues that there must be "the first being, which is being in al1 its purity ...
the first cause, o r God," he does not Say that we know this upon metaphysical
consideration of the Unmoved Mover, but upon the consideration of beings that are
not identically their act of being, but receive that act. In SCG, II, 52,7, St. Thomas
says that we know God as the first agent because the act of being belongs to him
more perfectly than to everything else? What else? Beings undergoing motion
(beings reduced from being in potency to beng in act), beings rnoving others (beings
reducing others from being in potency to being in act), beings going in an out of
being, etc.-al1 these are in act because of the one who is act and from whom they
have received their act of acts, or existence, which rnakes Him the First and
t herefore Unmoved and Uncaused.
Our knowledge of this First does not depend on knowing the Unmoved Mover as
the absolute principle of motion, but as the absolute principle of being (which is
prior t o generation and movernent, and from which every form and act receives its
actuality, its "is"). Thus even though Aiistotle's Unmoved Mover of the Physics and
St. Thomas' First Unmoved Mover of the First Way may be the same God, it is not
the same God in the same respect. Furthermore, even though both arguments
contain factors belonging to the study of natural philosophy, St. Thomas takes the
physically observed facts, like water getting hot, and analyzes them in terms of the
principles of being, because for him motion is always the motion of that which
possess the act of existing, and as szch primarily requires a cause. In this analysis he
is not depending upon the pnor establishment from the science of physics, that is, he
considers the cause of things as the cause of beings as such and not as having a
certain accidental or substantial form.17'

Whatever is the cause of things, considered as beings, must be the cause of things, not only
according as they are such by accidental foms, nor according as they are these by substantial
forms, but also to al1 that belongs to their being in any way. And thus it is necessary to say that
also primary matter is created by the universal cause of t h i r g ~ . ' ~ ~

The universal cause of things, which is God, is therefore known in considering

things as beings, and such a consideration, as we saw in chapter three, belongs to the
divine science or metaphysics and not to natural philosophy.
We may strengthen Our case further by pointing out that even when St. Thomas
speaks as a philosopher of nature, that is, when he considers motion in any of its

'71 To insist that St. Thomas depends on prior establishments of physics in his rnetaphysical
consideration of God is to ignore texts to the contrary. One such text is ST, 1, q. 44, a. 2. In his article
"Ad Mentem Thomae: Does NaturaI Philosophy Prove God?" Proceedings of the Amencan Catholic
Association 61 (1987).John Knasas makes the following observations on this point: "The universal
cause of the second stage [of 1, 44, 21 is not identifiable in any respect with the God of Aquinas'
religious belief. It is clearly a less then divine being.... philosophy advances further in its knowledge
of truth not by further implications of natural philosophy principles. Rather, one must change to a
new view point. It is the viewpoint of being as being. This expression designates the subject of
metaphysics. In sum, the second stage exhausts the principle of natural philosophy .... Aquinas'
mention of Aristotle here does not mean that Aquinas holds that Aristotle fails to demonstrate God.
The text ascribes this failure only to reasoning based on matter/form principles. Earlier in De
Potentia III, 5c, Aquinas appears to give to Aristotle, as well as to others, a knowledge of the creator
God. Yet, the ascripcion is done on the basis of Aquinas' daim that Aristotle attains a view of
universal esse. For Aquinas this is the viewpoint of metaphysics. Pnma pars 44, Sc, then, is Aquinas'
unabashed admission that to his mind natural phiIosophy principles alone do not produce reasoning
reaching God.
Secondly, if anything, what we find the Thomistic texts expressly and repeatedly asserting is
that the philosophical knowledge of God is the privilege of metaphysics. The only other knowledge
of God mentioned is not philosophical but theological. These texts are found a t l n de Tnn. V, 4c, and
in the proem to In Metaph and so, temporally speaking, bracket the quinque viae. These texts make
perfectly clear that for Aquinas God is philosophically reached in metaphysics. There is no admission
that any other philosophical science does the same." p. 2 il.
175
ST, 1, q. 44, a. 2.
aspects, for him it is always the motion of an existent; motion is always via ad esse.
Consider the foliowing text: "generation is the way from non-being to being; and
therefore that is generated absolutely which acquires being, to which the being of
another is not presupposed."16Generation, like every motion, is a reduction from
potency to act-from existing as able to be something to existing as that something.
Many an interpreter of the First Way, for example, does not consider it necessary to
see motion as immediately involving being (esse), which is to Say the perfect act.
But this is not Thomistic. Consider yet another text.

For the intelligibility [ratio] of motion is completed not only by that which pertains to motion in
the nature of things, but aiso by that which reason [ratio] apprehends. For in the nature of things
motion is nothing other than an imperfect act which is a certain incipience of perfect act in that
which is moved. Thus in that which is being whitened, something of whiteness already has begun
to be. But in order for the imperfect act to have the nature [ratio] of motion, it is further required
that we understand it is a mean between two extremes. The preceding condition is compared to
it as potency to act, and thus motion is caIled an act. The consequent condition is compared to it
as perfect to imperfect or as act to potency- And because of this motion is called the act of that
mhich M s t s in potency.ln
By seeing motion as an act, we are well on the way to seeing that which
actualises all acts. For St. Thomas motion is an act, it is an act we corne to know
before al1 others, but also an act that points us in the direction of al1 other acts, not
least of al1 in the direction of the chief of them-esse: "Now of al1 acts which are
perceived by us in a sensible way, motion is the best known and most evident to us;
and therefore the word 'actuality' was first referred to motion, and from motion the

176
St. Thomas Aquinas, In De generation et comptione, 1, 9. Opera Omnia, ed. Parmae, vol. XIX.
(New York: Musurgia Publishers, 1949). p. 229. (My own translation) "...generatio est via de non
esse ad esse; et id simpliciter generatur quid acquirit esse, cui non praesupponitur aliud esse..."
See also The finciples of Nature, ed. cit., 1, 1-6, pp. 7-9 where St. Thomas speaks of two levels of
being, act, potency, form, matter, and generation. In light of the text from In De gen, it is clear that
his discussion of motion in The Prhciples of Nature connotes some mode of be-ing (esse).
in In III Phys., lect. 5, n. 324. ed. cit., p. 152. (emphasis mine) That for St. Thomas a consideration of
motion is inseparable fiom a consideration of existence is evident also in In IX Metaph., lect. 3, nn.
1805-1806: "motion is not attributed to non-existent things... since to be moved means to be actual,
it follows that things which do not exist actuaiIy would exist actually; but this is obviously fdse."
word has extended to other t h i n g ~ . "But
~ "existence is that which makes every
form or nature actual; for goodness and humanity [and everything else including
motion] are spoken of as actual only because they are spoken of as e ~ i s t i n g . " ' ~ ~
Clearly, then, for St. Thomas, if not for Aristotle, physical principles or the
principles of motion entail metaphysical principles or principles of being (esse).
But perhaps the best way to see this is by reflecting philosophically on the data
of the First Way. The data is, of course, changing things. The question is: why rnust
we see them as changing existents? Our objector may ask: why must we separate a
changing thing's existence from its act of change? why cannot we simply take for
granted that it is, of course, an existing thing that is changing? We can take i t for
granted if we wish, but not if we wish to understand St. Thomas who says, "though
motion may occur for any existing thing, motion is apart from the being of the
thing."'eOIn other words, a cause of motion is not as such the cause of a moving
being: "the rnovable does not depend on the mover for its being, but only for its
being rno~ed."'~'
We must, therefore, distinguish between motion and existence in a

178
In IXMetaph., lect. 3, n. 1805, ed. cit., p. 667.
179
ST,1, q. 3, a. 4. As the basic actuality of things, existence is the act of a11 acts and the perfection of
al1 perfections. It is there visible to the eye of the intellect, if not to the senses, whenever we
encounter a being undergoing some motion. We cannot try and de-emphasise this by saying that
being refers only to an o r d i n q verb in the claim that motion is a reduction from being potentially t o
being actually; we cannot simply Say, "Why, of course the moving thing means an existing thing. No
one ever doubts that." This is to miss the point, the point of an act which actualises the moving being
and its act of motion. Consider the folIowing text. "And therefore Aristotle says that this verb 'is'
consignifies composition, because it does not signify it principally, but by way of consequence; for it
signifies primarily that which goes with the notion in the manner of actuality without condition. For
'is,' understood absolutely, signifies 'to be in act'; and therefore it signifies in the fashion of a verb.
But because the actuality which this verb 'is' principally signifies is in general the actuality of every
form or act [including motion], substantial or accidental, i t follo~vsthat when we wish to signiS that
any form or act whatsoever is actualiy in a subject, we signi& it by this verb 'is,' either absolutely or
in a certain respect; absolutely, in the present time, but in a certain respect in other times. And
therefore this verb 'is' consignifies composition, by way of consequence." St. Thomas, In I Petihem,
lect. 5, n. 22, t r a m by Joseph Owens in his Elernentanj Christian Metaphysics,p. 74, n. 15.
l Q s c III,
~ , 65.5.

181SCG.II, 57, 12.

moving thing, that is, we must see that t h e cause which causes the motion of a
moving thing must, if it is the highest cause, also cause the existence of a moving
thing. Seeing why this must be so requires a great effort. Gerard Smith has put forth
such an effort, and I shall try to present it?
It is not difficult to see that when a change occurs, something is changing. I t is a
little more difficult to see that the addition which accrues to the changing
something, or the subject of change, is not one and the same with the subject, and
that, therefore, the addition cornes from something else that accounts for the
addition; it accounts for it because it i s the addition and it imparts the addition to
the subject of change. St. Thomas uses the example of fire heating a piece of wood.
The wood becoming hot is the change occurring, the addition which accrues t o the
wood is heat. The heat is not identical with the wood, but it is identical with the fire
which imparts it to the wood, for which reason fire accounts for the addition in the
subject of change.
But it is much more difficult to see that t h e addition has such an impact on the
subject of change that the acquiring of the addition, the very activity of becoming
the addition (in St. Thomas' example, becoming hot), is the existing of that which
receives the addition (namely, of the piece of ~ o o d ) . ' ~ ~ well
o t ethat our piece of
wood can exist, prior to receiving the addition of heat, without becoming hot; but if
it is in fact here and now becoming hot it cannot exist without becoming hot, nor
can it become hot without existing. In other words, any way of being, any category
of being in which something is, is for that something to exist.
From this follows an al1 important conclusion. Because what exists is the
composite of the subject and its additions, we cannot but assert that it is the whole,

lasee his Naturd nieology, (New York: Macmillan, 1951). pp. 110-112.
la In the Second Way the same thing is true, except that there the activity of causing another to
receive an addition is the existing of that which imparts the addition.
the subject and its additions, which exists, without seeing that it is the composite
which is being caused to exist. This conclusion points us in the right direction in
which lies the true cause of a moving thing. That is t o Say, by looking in the
direction of that which is able t o cause the composite of the subject and itsacming
additions to exkt precisely as it is causing the composite t o be a composite, we are on
the right track to finding St. Thomas' First Mover. W e shall not be looking in the
right direction if we are seeking the cause of only the accruing additions of the
subject which presupposes or takes for granted the existence of the subject and the
whole composite. We shall miss St. Thomas' direction if, along with some
contemporary interpreters of the First Way, we Say that "each contingent thing
exists because of the causal activity of other contingent things in the uni~erse."'~
We need to shed more light on the direction. An actual piece of wood existing as
heated did not exist prior to the change (prior to the addition of heat accruing t o
it), only a potential piece of wood existing as heated existed prior to the change. To
Say that the cause of existence need not be invoked here betrays Our failure to see
the point. The subject of actual reception of heat existed potentially prior to the
actual change taking place. It was not only the additional qualifications which were
potential; it was the whole composite of the subject of change and its accming
additions, it was the whole existent. But this means that the potential subject of the
actual change taking place did not need a cause of its being a subject of actual
change when it was in the state of potentiality, because, as potential, it was not a n
actual subject of an actual change taking place here and now; but it does need such a
cause when it is here and now actually existing as changing. This is the heart of the
matter! Our First Changer, then, lies in the direction of a cause able to cause the

'" Michael Petenon,et al., Reason and Religious Belief, p. 79.

actual subject of the change taking place to exist, because the subject is existing only
as being changed and its being changed is caused.
Surely, we do not want to Say t hat fire is a cause which does not take for granted
the wood existing as heated, or which causes the wood to be existing as heated. That
is, we do not want to Say that fire is the cause of the existence of the composite of
the subject of actual change and its additional qualifications-fire does not actuate
the potential subject of actual change to exist as actual subject of that change. The
contribution of fire to the change its subject is undergoing here and now does not
sufficiently account for the full impact the change has on the actual composite. Fire
which is identically heat can impart the addition (which is heat) of the subject of
change, but unless it is identically existence, it cannot impart existence to the actual
whole composite of the subject of change and its accming additions,lE and that is
precisely what calls for a cause, that is, it clearly is caused. Nor do we want to Say
that the cause is some unmoved mover that is not identically existence, because that
would simply postpone the answer to Our question: What is able to cause the actual
composite of the subject and its accruing additions to exist inasmuch as it is causing
the composite to be an actual composite?
But it is clear that the answer to Our question can only come if we are engaged in
metaphysics, that is, in thinking about existence as the highest act. Physical proofs
of an Unmoved Mover may demonstrate God, but they will not do so as a proof that
accounts for a full understanding of potency/act relationship which is required in a
reduction from potency to act of an actual composite of the subject of change and its.
acquired additions. The potency/act relationship always involves existence for St.
Thomas, and that is why it is always a metaphysical relationship. W e may wish to

lS W e rnay wish to dispute, on the grounds of twentieth-century natural sciences that fire is not
identically heat. But that by itself would not min Our argument, because something else may be
identically heat which is not thereby identically existence.
stop with physics, that is, short of the act of existence, but 1 cannot see why we
would wish to do so knowing hl1 well that for St. Thomas it is there as the act of
acts, and knowing, not only that it requires a cause, but also that for St. Thomas
God is "the proper cause of the act of being." If we shall ever reach God assuch a
cause, we shall have to see the act of being in that which is caused, namely, the
moved being, the causing being, etc., which we know to be caused because we see it
going From potentially be-ing something to actually be-ing that something. But, as
we shall see when we turn to the Five Ways in chapter eleven, to reach such a cause
is to reach a cause that must be identified with its operation of causing, that is, it
must not only cause, not only exercise the action of causing, but it must be that
action if a full account of the highest of causes is to be had.
Finally, we must consider our objection form another angle-that of textual
procedure. It is an objection that Joseph Owens considers. The objection is as
follows: "according to the order of presentation of the Summa Theologiae a primary
movent is first demonstrated, and only several articles aftenvards is it shown to be
identical with its own existence. This is alleged to indicate that the order of
procedure is first to establish a primary mover, and then, after further reasoning, to
arrive at its identity with subsistent exi~tence."'~
We can safely assume that as a theologian St. Thomas is interested in arguing for
God in a way that enables his readers to understand Him as closely as possible to
the way He is revealed in the Holy Scriptures. This means that he wants to show
that the Unmoved Mover is one with His existence and perfect in every way. The
question is this: 1s St. Thomas identibing the Unmoved Mover with the being who
is His own existence in the First Way or does he argue for that identification later?
We can restate the question this way: Does St. Thomas argue in later articles for the

'86~osephOwens, "Actudity in the nima Via ", in St. Thomas Aquinm on the Existence of God, p. 196.
I shall present here Owens' reply to this objection because it seems to me to be very plausible.
being who is identically His existence from the Unmoved Mover, or does he
understand the Unmoved Mover already in the Fint Way as supreme existential
actuality?
In the article immediately after the Five Ways St. Thomas considers whether
God is a body. One reason for a negative answer is as follows:

Secondly, because the first being must of necessity be in act, and in no way in potentiality. For
although in any single thing that passes from potentiality to actuality, the potentiality is prior in
time to actudity; for whatever is in potentiality cari be reduced into actuality only by some being
in actuality. Now it has already been proved that God is the First Being. I t is therefore
impossible that in God there should be any potentiality.lg

Where has it been proved that God is the First Being? In the proof for God's
existence presented in five different ways.'88 Fint Being, then, can be equated with
what has been established in the conclusions of the Five Ways. In the case of the
First Way, Owens suggests,

why not remain within the context of the reasoning through actuality and potentiality? One
would then regard the notion pnrnurn ens as understood in what follows in the prima via upon
the principle "de potentia autem non potest aliquid reduci in actum nisi per aiiquod mactu."
Every movent is a movent insofar as it is an ens actu. In this understanding of a movent in the
prima via, the ensuing stages through the series of movents to the primary movent would require
that the primary movent be regarded as the primary m actu. Reasoning later in the setting of
actuality and potentiality, St. Thomas could therefore readily refer back to the pn'murn rnouens as
the pnmurn ens.189

But what reason does St. Thomas give for asserting that there is no potentiality in
the First Being, that He is pure actuality? In the first three articles of Q. 3 no reason
is given, and then in the fourth article God is said to be Ipsurn Esse Subsistem
because "we cal1 God the first efficient cause", and as such He does not have His
existence caused, which has already been established in the Five Ways.

187
ST, 1, q. 3, a. 1.
e not Five Proofs, there are Five Ways. Nowhere does St. Thomas equate pmbatio with
' @ ~ h e rare
via. Therefore, in whatever Way God has been demonstrated, the First Being has been demonstrated.
But let us reason further.
'" Owens, St Thomas on the Existence..., pp. 197-198.
 A careful examination of Q. 3, a. 4, will reveal no reference to the ultimate
principle of motion as a grounds for asserting that in God essence and existence are
identical. Al1 three arguments for asserting this identity in God are made along the
lines of existence, and the second argument does so in terrns of actuality and
potentiality refemng us to a ready conclusion (mentioned in a. 1) that in God there
is no potency:

Secondly, existence is that which makes every form or nature actual; for goodness and humanity
are spoken of as only because they are spoken of as existing. Therefore, existence must be
cornpared to essence, if the latter is a distinct reality, as actuality to potentiality. Therefore. since
in God there is no potentiality, as s h o w above (a. 1), it follows that in Him essence does not
differ from existence. lgO
W e are here clearly in rnetaphysics because a principle that something can be actual
only i f i t is made actual by existence is a metaphysical one. But this principle, like the
principle that the first being must necessarily be in act and free of al1 potency, is
nowhere argued for. In other words, nowhere in the Summa Theologiae did we
receive a lesson in metaphysics preparing and establishing this principle. St. Thomas
takes it for granted that we already possess it, and well he should given that we are
reading a work in theology and not a work in metaphysics like De Ente et Essentia.
This principle is a t work whenever we are dealing with actuality, and we are dealing
with actuality even when we are dealing with motion. Thus neither the Way to God
from motion escapes this principle. Owens describes its role in the First Way:

The order in which the conclusions are drawn from the nature of the immobile movent
established in the prima via is consequently clear enough. First, the immobile rnovent is found to
have no potentiality a t all, and accordingly is designated as pure actuality. Secondly, this
absence of potentiality requires that the essence of the primary movent be its existence. The
latter conclusion was drawn with the presupposition [not an argument] that existence is the
actuality of every form or nature.lg'

In other words, we must see that for St. Thomas the Unmoved Mover is
unmoved because it is the First mover, and it can only be the first if in it there is no

190
ST,1. q. 3, a. 4.
lgl Owens. St. Thomas on the ikstence...., p. 200.
potentiality, and therefore to be the First means to be pure actuality. But pure
actuality is Being Itself (Ipsurn Esse), therefore the First Way, even in its premises,
is very much concerned with existence insofar as it is concerned with actuality and
potentiality. The first premise of the First Way is clearly concerned with
potentiality and actuality, a point to which Geach and many other contemporary
interpreters pay too little attention or ignore entirely, and it is therefore concerned
with existence (which is the domain of metaphysics) along with the rest of the
argument flowing from it. We must, therefore, see St. Thomas arguing from moved
existents existing hic et nunc as moved in the world of Our sense experience, and to
the Unmoved Mover causing both the nature and the existence of their motion
Who is the First Unmoved because His existence causes the existence of moved
existents which actualises the very nature of their motion. In the rest of this work
we shall argue for this in detail.
 Part Two

AN ENCOUNTER WITH BEING

 CHAPTER V

A Brief Look at the Character of First Philosophy

"Philosophgcan take mot only in radical reflection upon the rneaning and possibility of its o m pmject. "

Edmund Husserl, Ideas

1 said in the introduction that the main task of this work is to present the
philosop hical groundwork necessary for reading profitably St. Thomas' Five Ways;
reading them with an understanding of why he thinks they successfully demonstrate
God's existence. The first step in fulfilling this task is t o Say something about
rnetaphysics as St. Thomas understands it. This is a necessary step because modern
understandings of metaphysics are not only different from St. Thomas' but are often
contrary to it. This will help us avoid making rash assumptions about the context of
the Five Ways. W e must, therefore, acquaint ourselves with his manner of
philosophizing and make every effort t o philosophise in the way he does, if we wish
to profit from his thought.
Unfortunately, the philosophical tradition which St. Thomas inherited from
ancient Greeks and medieval Christians, and which he himself greatly enriched
during his short life, is made obscure t o us by trends of modern and contemporary
thought. For example, in our day the methods of empirical sciences are regarded as
the paradigm for attaining knowledge. In order to profit from reading St. Thomas we
must set aside this narrow view of knowledge. The best way to do this is to approach
the thought of St. Thomas in humility and with a vibrant sense of wonder.'= Such
an approach is not necessarily reflected in our being in agreement with St. Thomas,
but it is necessarily reflected in an attitude that does not dismiss St. Thomas'
thought as nonsensical, as coming from the "Dark Ages", and as desperately in need
of refinement and correction by methods of modern logic and empiricd science^.'^
But what is that before which we should humble Our minds and hearts and
approach it in childlike wonder without placing conditions before it? The answer is
not St. Thomas' thought or the thought of anyone else." The answer is: the object
of St. Thomas' thought-the real, or that which is, or being. In order to understand
St. Thomas' philosophical activity we rnust engage with him in the study of being.
The project of St. Thomas Aquinas, which consists in al1 of the available bodies
of knowledge of his day headed by philosophy and in the service of sacred theology,
is a structure that owes its foundation, frarne, and much of the content to ancient
Greek philosophy, notably to the philosophy of Aristotle. It owes it even more to his
Christian faith. As a true philo-sopher, or a lover and seeker of wisdom, St. Thomas
erected his entire project on two beams of truth: the truth of reason and the truth of
the Christian faith. He did not see a dichotomy between these two beams because

' = ~ l a t ostresses the paramount importance of wonder in philosophy in his Theaetetus. "The sense of
wonder is the mark of the philosopher. Philosophy indeed has no other origin." 155d
'% W e ought t o avoid, for example, the sort of attitude a modern philosopher Iike Hegel exhibits
toward medieval philosophy. "As iate as the nineteenth century we find Hegel in his Lectures on the
History of Philosophy declaring that in order t o 'move on' quickly he wilI skip over the thousand
years between the sixth and the seventeenth century, will 'put on seven-league boots.' And when he
has a t 1 s t sped successfully on to Descartes, he declares that now he c m 'cry land like t h e sailor'; for
it would 'be asking too much of anyone' to study the philosophy of the Middle Ages 'by autopsy',
since 'it is as prolix as it is paitry, terribly written and volurninous'." See josef Pieper, Scholastickm,
(New York: Pantheon Books, 1960), pp. 15-16.
'" 1 am certain that St. Thomas does not value having disciples (Thomists) whose chief interest as
thinkers is t o acquaint themselves with the "thought of St. Thomas." For he says, "The study of
philosophy is not for the purpose of knowing what men have thought, but t o know the truth of
things." (Commenta y on the Heauens, Bk. 1, lect. 22. Parmae Edition Vol. 19, p. 58.)
he saw both as having their source in God. His love of intellect and knowledge, and
the consequent conviction that to cultivate the life of the mind through philosophy
and the sciences is to be busy in God's vineyard, is expressed very clearly in one of
his earlier works.

The knowledge of the principles that are known to us naturally has been implanted in us by God;
for God is the Author of our nature. These principles, therefore, are also contained by the divine
Wisdom. Hence, whatever is opposed to them is opposed t o the divine Wisdom, and, therefore,
cannot corne frorn God. That which we hold by faith as divinely revealed, therefore, cannot be
contrary to our natural knowledgel%

Now even though St. Thomas holds that the naturally known principles (1 shall
Say something about these in the next chapter) are divinely implanted, he does not
mean that they are divinely revealed. To Say that something is divinely implanted is
not to Say that it is divinely revealed. When St. Thomas says that something is
naturally known he means that it is known by nature, that is, by our human nature
which we owe to him who created us human, and in so creating us, implanted in us
certain powers of knowledge and action.
What, then, are the naturally known principles or starting points of the truth
acquired by the power of intellect? To answer the question we must first have a
brief look a t metaphysics as St. Thomas understood it. This will involve making a
rough and very brief sketch of the rise of philosophy in the West with an eye toward
expounding the naturally known principles which we shall need in order to do the
metaphysics necessary for understanding the Five Ways. The question is: What
kind of principles are we seeking to expound? Principles of what?

The Forerumers of Philosophy

Through Aristo tle, St. Thomas inherited the philosophical tradition that has its
beginnings in sixth or seventh-century Greece. Much of Our knowledge of some of
the details of early Greek philosophy comes from Aristotle himself who thought it
wise to begin his own philosophizing by surveying the accomplishrnents of his
predecessors in order to make use of what is sound and to avoid what is notamThe
beginning of western philosophy interests us insofar as it reveals how the human
intellect comes to think about the nature and importance of that which gives rise to
first principles and that which will eventually lead the mind to God.
It may be said that with the rise of philosophy in Greece we have for the first
time the emergence of scientific thought developed apart from religious thought. It
is true that throughout the empires of the Far and Middle East pnor to the seventh
century B.C. people used their reason to improve their understanding of the nature
of everything around them. But their attempts have never been purely rational,
never explicitly distinguished from their religious and mythical writings. The extant
writings of their sages attest to this. It is also true that no Greek philosopher
philosophised having his mind innocent of the religions of his day, nor were his
works completely free of religious overtones. But Greek philosophy, a t least as it
was shaped by its greatest minds, differs from Oriental thought of Zoroaster, the
Brahmans, Budda, Lao-Tse, and Confucius in that it begim as distinct from religious
appeals to popular myths and poetic symbolism, and ends up a product of pure
reasoning. lmIn the writings of the Presocratics, of Plato, and of Aristotle we see the
Greeks recognizing the boundaries of philosophy as an area limited to the scientific
study of purely rational truths, of truths discovered by hurnan reason operating on

IgSThis he deterrnined by looking a t the real things about which he and his predecessors were
philosophizing. Aristotelian sources of ancient Greek philosophy can be found in his Physics (Bk. 1,
chs. 2 and 4), Psychology (Bk. 1, ch. 2) Metaphysics (Bk. 1). and On the Heauens ( Bk. I , ch. 2).
lm Exceptions can, of course, be forind in Pythagoras who established a religious sect, and
Empedocles who was also a religious teacher and magician with a few miracles ascribed to him. (See
Milton C. Nahrn, Selections from Early Greek Philosophy, (Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice-Hall, Inc.,
1964). pp. 47 and 112. Even Plato now and then turns to myth in some of his dialogues, particularly
the maeus and Phaedm. In Aristotle, however, we End a more purely rationa1 philosophizing.
its own power and without reliance on any form of divine revelation, and as
distinguished from the kind of intellectual activity a t work in poetry and
mythology .'%
The rational truths of what? The philosopher studies al1 things and events in the
world, particularly the things that are not man-made, things that are natural, that is,
not artificiai, not produced by an art. Aristotle summed up the intellectual progress
of his predecessors as follows: "... they wondered at the difficulties close at hand;
then advancing little by little, they discussed difficulties also about greater matters,
for example, about the changing attributes of the Moon and of the Sun and of the
stars, and about the generation [genesis] of the ~ n i v e r s e . "Now
' ~ what made the
Presocratics philosophem par excellence, and therefore different frorn the sages of
the Far and Middle East, is that they inquired into the "why" of things in front of
them using only their reason, and pushed the "why" of them until they reached what
they thought were the ultimate answers or the first principles of al1 things.

The surviving fragments of the Presocratics hlly confirm the fact that interest in matters like
the phenomena of the Sun and the moon and the stars ended in the inquiry about the genesis of
the whole universe. When, as Aristotle (Metaph., A 1,981b27-29) points out in this connection,
inquiries concerning the "why" of happenings are pushed to the ultimate causes of things, and so
arrive at causes about which one cannot ask a further "why," then one is already in the domain of
wisdom or philosophy.an

In other words, the Presocratics wanted to know what makes al1 things real
(actual), what it is that ultimately explains why anything is real at all; they tned "to
understand al1 things in light of what is basic and ultimate from the standpoint of
human r e a ~ o n . " ~
This
' is the most basic of al1 philosophical questions, and the

'" The activity of a geometrician and an astronomer inquiring into the nature and rnovernent of the
stars, and on the basis of that inquiry predicting eclipses of the Sun and the moon is, if he is correct,
an attainment a rational tmth.
'99~rist~tle's
~ e t a ~ h ~ s iA
i c2,982b
s, 13-17; trans. by H. G. Apostle.
~ o s e Owens,
~h A Histoq of Ancient Western Philosophy, (Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice-Hall,
Inc., 1959), p. 4.
"' lbid.
answer to it determines one's entire philosophical project. Thales of Miletus, who is
perhaps the first Greek philosopher, thought the answer is water. What he meant is
that everything is in some way water, that water lies at the bottom of the nature of
everything, not as the ingredient of everything, but as that which everything in
sorne way is, or that from which everything in some way proceeds. Thales thought
that water is the ultimate "why" of everything, and that in knowing water we know
the highest cause and the first principle of everythingamAnother philosopher
proposed air as the ultimate "why", another fire, another the mind,m until one of
them, Parmenides of Elea, finally gave the right answer-being.
Ever since Parmenides philosophers have Iived, in one way or another, upon the
intellectual capital of his answer. Plato and Aristotle both accept Parmenides'
answer but they differ radically on what being is. Their different understandings
have given rise to two main positions in metaphysics and consequently in
epistemology. St. Thomas rejects the main tenet of Platonic metaphysics, and
adapts and amends the Aristotelian position. 1 shall Say more about the two
positions in chapter nine.
The ultimate answer, then, to the "why" of a11 things is technically called the
first or universal principle which gives rise to other principles that are, as we shall
see in the next chapter, also first, although in different ways, and therefore not
ultimately first. The inquiry into this ultimate principle is consequently called first

a n ~ h a Thales
t thought water to be the ultimate "why" of the first principle of things is first pointed
out by Aristotle. "Thales, ...,says that this principle is Water (and on account of this he also declared
that the earth rests on water), perhaps coming to this notion by observing that al1 nutriment is moist
and that heat itself is generated from the moist and is kept dive by it (and that from which things are
generated is the principbe of dl)." (Metaph. A, 3,983b20-27)
I am relying on Aristotelian interpretation of the Presocratics' search for the first principle
because 1think St. Thomas accepts it.
Thales' answer may strike Our modem ears as Iess strange if we remember t h a t many are still on
his side today when instead of water they propose "energy" as the answer to the ultimate "whyn of
things.
=This answer also has a modern counterpart in 'evolution."
philosophy or metaphysics, and engaging into the inquiry is, according to Aristotle
and St. Thomas, an intellectual activity that is most properly philosophical. If being
is the universal principle of everything, then the study of being is the proper object
of first philosophy or metaphysics. But is being the first principle? Why is
Parmenides nght and the other Presocratics wrong?

St. Thomas' Account of First Philosophy

We cannot, I think,make a better beginning in answering the question t h a . to
give St. Thomas' account of first philosophy which he lays out in the prologue to his
commentary on Aristotle's Metaphysics. 1 shall translate the prologue and comment
on a few of its points.

As the Philosopher says in his Politics, when several things are ordained to one, it must be that
one of them is che regulator or the d e r , and t h e others the regulated or the ruled. This indeed is
clear in the union of soul and body; for the soul naturally commands, and the body obeys.
Similady, even among the powers of the soul, the irascible and concupiscible are ruIed in the
natural order by reason. But a11 the sciences and arts are ordained to one thing, namely to the
perfection of man, which is his beatitude. Therefore it is necessary that one of them be the
governess of al1 the others, which rightly claims the name of wisdom. For it belongs to the wise
to regulate the others.
It is possible to consider what this science is, and what kind of things it is concerned with. if
that which is suitable to the ruler is carefully considered. For just as, according to the
Philosopher in the aforementioned book, men of stronger intellect are naturdly rulers and
rnasters of others, so the men who are strong in body and weak in intellect, are naturally slaves:
so that science must naturally be the govemess of ai1 the others which is most intellectual. But
this is the science that is employed about the most intelhgible objects.
We can,however, take [the meaning OF] most intelligible objects in three ways.
Ent, indeed, is /rom the orderof knozering. For the intellect receives certitude from those things
which seem to be more intelligible. Therefore, since the certitude of science is acquired by the
intellect from causes, a knowledge of causes seerns to be the most intellectual. Therefore aiso,
that science which considers first causes seems to be the govemess of al1 the others in the highest
degree.

We may at this point ask ourselves: Can this science be physics, or biology, or
any other empirical science? A negative answer is already becorning clear, for
physics, for example, does not study the first causes of al1 things but only the causes
of motion, which does not, for example, include the causes of biological life. That is
why the biological sciences are needed, which again do not study the first causes of
al1 things but only the causes of life of the living things, leaving out the causes of
non-living things and other kinds of causes of al1 things. And so it is with al1 the
empirical sciences-they each leave out not only a n aspect of reality, but the aspect
of reality which belongs to al1 real things, and this makes them undeserving of the
title of the governess of al1 the sciences.
But what about al1 of the ernpirical sciences combined; can it be said that their
joined effort reaches the first causes? The answer is a resounding no for the
following reason. Al1 aspects of real things studied by empirical sciences neither
individually nor collectively reveal the aspect that belongs to al1 things that are. Let
us ask ourseives this question: What kind of thing is every thing that is? The answer
is not a mouing thing, nor a living thing. Nor is it, as some Presocratics thought, a
water or air or fire-thing. Why not? If the ultimate nature of al1 things were to be
pitched on any one or al1 of these aspects, it would force us to regard reality as
exclusively material. And what is wrong with that? Exclusively materialistic
explanations leave out entire areas of reality unexplained-for example, human
cognitive powers in its acts of conception, judgment, and reasoning (see n. 223, p.
115 below), and appetitive powers in its acts of willing and choosing are
unsatisfactorily explained in terms of material causes alone. We need, therefore, an
aspect of the real to which belong al1 things, both material and irnmaterial.
Even though most Presocratics were wrong about the thing which they picked
as that which ultimately belongs to al1 things, they were absolutely right when they
sought that which belongs to al1 things, namely, the ultimate "why" or the principle
of al1 things. They were right because their entire philosophical activity rested on
the true assumption that everything, absolutely everything, has something in
common with everything else, namely that which makes them al1 actual and is their
ultimate "why" or principle. In other words, everything is for one, and only one
reason actual, or a something (aliquid), and consequently knowable. If this were not
tme, we could not know many things or any thing. For if everything did not have
something in common with everything else, that which makes it and al1 other things
actual, or a something, after knowing one actual something we could not know
another actual something, because something one and something two have nothing in
common, that is, they d o not share that which makes them a something, or actual,
and consequently knowable, for only sornethings, or actual things are knowable. But
we do know many sornethings. The question is what makes them knowable given
that we do in fact know them? It is not, as we saw, water, because in knowing watsr
we do not know al1 things, particularly the immaterial things. Nor is it any other
material thing. I t is rather that which, for lack of a better term, realifies or nctualises
all things; it is, as Parmenides rightly saw, being. In other words, everything that is
has this in common with everything else: it is a being or an existent, and it is this
fact that makes al1 things somethings, or actual, and therefore knowable. To know
something, anything, is to know it, first and foremost as being? Reality is,
therefore, first and foremost a collection of beings, and each body of knowledge deals
with one class of beings?
But what kind of fact is being, and what is it to know being? The answer to both
questions is philosophy of one kind or another. But as far as "pure" philosophic
positions on the nature and knowledge of being are concerned, there are really only
two: Plato's, and al1 the positions in one way or another essentially akin to his, and
Aristotle's, and al1 the positions essentially akin to bis? We shall say more about

2 M ~ h iiss certainly Parmenides' position, and, as we shall see later, St. Thomas'. In o n e of
Parmenides' fragments (8.34)on being he says, "Knowing and the condition of knowledge are the
same, for you will not find knowing without (that which) is." This, Owens, points out, means "that
without beingas its object there c a n o t be any knowing." ( A Histoy ofAncimt ...p. 61. n. 9)
" For a more detailed account of the intellect's detection of what is cornmon to al1 things see
Francis Collingwood, Philosophy of Nature, (Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice-Hall, Inc., 1960). ch. 4.
axT h e better known philosophers with essentially Platonic metaphysics and epistemology are
Plotinus, St. Augustine, St. Anselm, Duns Scotus, Descartes, Leibniz, Kant, and Hegel. Albert the
Great, St. Thomas Aquinas, and John of St. Thomas are the best known Aristotelians.
these positions in chapter nine where we shall compare them. At this point let it
suffice to say that within the Platonic tradition to know k i n g is to know first an
essence, for example, it is t o know feline, human, etc. In the Aristotelian tradition to
know b h g is to know first an individual existent; not feline, but Fifi, not human,
but Bob.

Second [meaning of the phrase "most intelIigible abjects"] isfrom the cornparison of the i&eIIc"ct
to the senses. For while sense perception is the knowledge of the particulars, the intellect seems
to differ from sense perception in that it comprehends the universals. Therefore, that science is
intellectual in the highest degree which is employed about the universals. These indeed are
being, and those which follow being, such as unity, multiplicity, potency, and act. But principles
of this kind ought not a t al1 remain undetermined [we shall try to make our knowledge of being
determined in the next chapter], since without these i t is not possible to have the cornplete
knowledge of principles which are proper to any genus or species. Nor again should t h e y be
treated in any particular science: because, since a knowledge of each genus of being requires
these [principles], they would be treated with equaI reason in every particular science. I t
remains, therefore, for one common science to treat principles of this kind; which, since i t is
intellectual in the highest degree, is the governess of al1 the other sciences.

I t may be puzzling to our modern minds that someone would say t h a t first
principles "would be treated with equal reason in every particular science" unless a
separate common science were to treat them. It is because this puzzles us that we do
not nowadays see as clearly as St. Thomas did the need for first philosophy or
metaphysics. St. Thomas is pointing out here a very important task of philosophy
which has largely been lost to us, and to Our philosophers; it is the task that elevates
philosophy above the empirical sciences. He is saying that unless one common
science were to treat the first principles, each science would have to treat thern
because "a knowledge of each genus of being requires [first principles]."
Another way to make the sarne point is this: one of philosophy's main tasks is to
tell us what ultirnately are the various actual somethings that belong t o every
particular science. Philosophizing, as we are seeing St. Thomas describe i t , is an
intellectual activity that precedes al1 other scientific activities. It precedes them
because it asks questions about that which underlies al1 branches of knowledge; and
it asks such questions because it looks for the ultimate "why" or the first principle of
al1 actual somethings. The actual sornethings are not what a philosopher, seeking the
first principle, rests in; it is something beyond them, and in which they al1 share as
actual somethings. For example, a biologist treats only a particular category of being,
that is, a class of actual somethings. But what makes this class a separate class from
other classes properly belonging to other sciences? We cannot give an answer
without the knowledge of the first principle of al1 actuat somethings. Now the kind
that everything ultimately is, which makes it a n actual sornething, and therefore
knowable, is a being or an existent. Within this ultimate and largest class of actual
things are different categories of beng. We are not saying that being is a genus, but
that bang, as the principle of al1 actual somethings, resides, as their ultimate act, in
al1 actual somethings which belong to various categories. To tell us what al1 the
different subclasses or categories of actual somethings (like those belonging t o
biology) are, which are made actual by their first principle or being (and are for that
reason beings or existents before they are anything else), is the task of philosophy,
and this task cannot be fulfilled without the knowledge of being. Thus, without
philosophy we can only know descriptions of various actual somethings, but not
what kind each of them is, and to what category of being, and therefore to what
valid field of knowledge i t belongs (because knowledge is first and foremost of being,
of that which makes the known actual, and therefore knowable). Without first
philosophy we cannot see how different facts and the sciences that study them are
related to one another and how they can work together. Philosophy, or better yet,
rnetaphysics integrates and harmonises al1 the different aspects of our intellectual
activity. This is why St. Thomas says that firstphilosophy governs al1 of the sciences.
In sum, what the Theologian is saying is that each science can know its own
domain of inquiry only if the category of being it studies has been made known first.
This knowledge is philosophical, and, St. Thomas maintains, can be acquired only if
we engage ourselves in the study of causes that is intellectual in the highest degree,
narnely the study of first causes. This study is firstphilosophy or metaphysics, and it
should be sufficiently clear by now why St. Thomas, along with the entire ancient
and medieval philosophical tradition, thinks that this study is the highest and the
most authoritative.
1 am aware that, up to this point, we have encountered the terms firstprinciples,
firstprnciple, and first causes without having made it sufficiently clear what these
are and how they are related. 1s h d l give an account of them in chapter six.
Let us now turn back to St. Thomas' prologue.

Third [meaning of the phrase "most intelligible objects"] is from t h e knowledge of the intellect.
For since each thing has intellective power [as opposed to perceptive power] by the fact that it is
immune o r free from matter, the most intelligible things must be those which are separate from
m a t t e r . For the intelligible object and the intellect must be proportionate, and of one genus,
since the intellect and the intelligible object are one in actuality. Indeed, those things are
separate from matter in the highest degree which abstract not only frorn designated matter, "as
the natural forms grasped universally, which the natural science [philosophy of nature] treats,
but from sensible matter entirely. And not only according to ratio [that which is inteIligible in
them], as [are the objects] of mathematics, but also according to being, as God and the
intelligences. Therefore, the science which considers such things seems t o be intellectual in the
highest degree, and a mler or governess of the others.
But this threefold consideration ought to be attributed not t o different sciences but to one.
For the mentioned separate substances are the universal and first causes of being. However, it
belongs to the sarne science to consider proper causes of some genus and the genus itself: as the
natural science considers principIes of a natural body. Therefore, i t must be that it ertains to the
same science to consider separate [intellectual] substances, and common b e i n g l which is the
genus of which the mentioned substances are the common and universal causes.

m ~ h i stoo may puzzle us. Why does St. Thomas say that the most intelligible things must be those
which are separate from matter? H e is not, 1 think, talking about things that d o not have matter as
part of their make up; he is not talking about angels, for example. H e is talking about what is
knowable about al1 things, including the material things. Now al1 material things have one thing in
cornrnon, narnely, that they are material. Therefore, we cannot know different kinds of material things
by focusing on different aspects of their materiality; if we did, we would not know them as different,
we would not know what makes one different from the other because their materiality is precisely
what they al1 have in common. In order t o know what kind each material thing is, which is what it is
t o know this thing as this thing, our intellects must grasp that which is separate hom their matter and
makes them the kind that they are, and therefore knowable. This is their fonn o r essence, and their
esse or act of being. The study of matter-fonn composition belongs, according to ancient and
medieval philosophical traditions, t o philosophy of nature (scientia naturalis). Aristotle's Phzjsics is
the prime example of this kind of study. The study of the act of being and its relation to other acts
belongs to metaphysics.
''common being" St. Thomas means. among other things, t h a t which al1 material and
immaterial things have in common, t h a t which makes them actual, a sornething and therefore
 It appears from this that, although this science considers the three [classes of things]
mentioned [namely, common being, intellectual substances, and G o a , nevertheless, it does not
consider any of them as its subject but only common being itself. For this is the subject of a
science whose causes and properties we are seeking, but not the causes theniselves of some
studied genus. For the knowledge of the causes of some genus is the end to which the
consideration of a science extends. Now although the subject of this science is common being,
nevertheless the whole of it is predicated of those things which are separate fiom matter
according to being (esse) and that which is intelligible in them (ratio). For not only are those
things said to be separated from matter according to being and ratio which are never able to be in
matter, Iike God and the intellectual substances, but also those which are able to be without
matter, like common being. But this would not happen, if they were dependent on matter for
their being. [In other words, there could not be a science of being of al1 things, if the being of al1
things depended on matter.]
Therefore, according to the three [classes of things] mentioned [namely, common being,
intellectual substances, and Goq, from which the perfection of this science is attained, three
names arse. It is called the divine science or theologg, inasmuch as it considers the mentioned
substances; rnetaphysics, inasmuch as it considers being and those things which naturally follow
being. For things that transcend the physical order are discovered by way of anaiysis, as the more
common [are discovered] after the less common. I t is called firstphilosophy, inasmuch as it
considers the first causes of things. Therefore i t is thus evident what the sub'ect of this science is,
and how it is reIated to the other sciences, and by which names i t is called.a08
This makes evident to us once more what science we must embark on in order to
understand St. Thomas' philosophizing about God; it is the science of comrnon being
or being as being. For it seems that in this science, in which we consider first causes
of things, that is beings, we also come upon God; but we do this not by setting out to
find God, but rather by considering the nature and causes of common being, that is,
being common to al1 things. Smart, Copleston, Geach, Kenny, and Rowe a11 look at
the First. Second, and Third Ways of St. Thomas without telling us explicitly or
implicitly how St. Thomas sees the data of those Ways as related to the ultimate
primarg cause of being. T here is no talk of being anywhere in their interpretations,
nor do they show that they understand actuality and potentiality as St. Thomas
does, namely, as issuing from being. But St. Thomas clearly states that the science of
common being is the same science where we come to philosophise about God.

knowable. Another expression of it is being as being, or beingassuch. See pp. 141-142 below.
In Duodecim Libros Metaphysicorum ArLrtotelir Expositio. editio iam a M.R Cathala, O.P., extrata
retractatur cura et studio P.Fr. Raymundi M. Spiazzi, O.P.; Turin, 1950. pag. 1-2.
 But before we proceed further in the direction St. Thomas points to them that
would philosophise about God, we ought to heed the warning to stay clear of
another path; the path, often taken by Neo-scholastics, of thinking that the object of
metaphysics is the concept of being expounded with the aid of first principles.
Etienne Gilson points out an undesirable consequence of taking such a path.

First, metaphysics does not treat of the concept of being as being any more than physics treats of
the notion of becoming. If they did, these sciences would be turned into logics. Physics has to do
with changing being itself, as metaphysics has to do with being insofar as it is being. W e
emphasise, with being itseif and not only with the concept of being. Nothing can be inferred from
the concept of being as being; everything c m be said about being as being. But for that we must
reach it, and if we do not comprehend it, a t least we get in touch with it and then never lose
contact with it, under pain of losing our way in any empty verbaIisrn.210
Philosophizing in this way will inevitably happen whenever, in Our attempt to
gain knowledge of actual somethings we try to reasonfrorn principles rather than in
agreement with them and under the light they shed.211
Two other things remain for us to consider by way of preparing the first floor of
the metaphysical groundwork of the Five Ways: a more detailed account of the first
principles which we now know stem from being (the ultimate principle and the stuff
of knowledge), and an account of intuition and knowledge of esse; that is, of a
properly Thomistic conception of being. Such is the object of chapters six, seven,
and eight. Much of modern philosophy disagrees with the content of these chapters,
and that is fine. But this content is part and parce1 of al1 of the Theologian's
philosophizing. We may not wish so to philosophise, but we cannot convincingly
argue that the Five Ways fail in their task, unless we first successfully refute the
content of chapters six, seven, and eight, for in philosophy of the Theologian being,
the cause of being, and God are inseparable.

*'OEtienne Gilson. Christian Philosophy, trans. by Armand Maurer. (Toronto: PIMS, 1993). pp. 67-
68.
*" Aristotelian and Thomistic understanding of what it rneans eo philosophise in agreement with and
under the light of first principles may be seen in the final chapter of Aristotle's Posterior Analytics
and St. Thomas' cornrnentary on it.
 CHAPTER VI

The Principies of Being and Knowledge

"The knouledge of tmth is e q , namely i n m u c h as the mal1 amount of it is k n o m through self-

euident pinciples, terhich are euident to al!-"

St. Thomas Aquinas, In IIMetaph., lect. 1, n. 277.

It is surprising that even though St. Thomas says, that "the investigation of the
human reason for the most part has falsity present within it, and this is due partly to
the weakness of our intellect in judgment, and partly to the admixture of image^,"^"
he does not begin his intellectual enterprise in the manner in which Descartes and
Kant do, namely with a grandiose attempt to establish al1 the ways in which error
and falsity can be avoided. St. Thomas' philosophy does not arise out of fear, the fear
of falling into the abyss of error. He does not see the human mind as naturally
seeking the illusions of the senses against which the philosopher must first devise
the rnethod of finding truth. The Theologian's enterprise of discovering truth is not a
search determined by doubt. Instead, he "entrusts the discovery of the truth
principle which serves as starting point for acquiring al1 other truths ... [and]returns
to the very sources of our acts of knowledge: the nature of man and the nature of his
cognitive acts."" It is important to have some understanding of how St. Thomas
goes about discovering the truths of reason because it clearly points out the
direction in which t o seek the difference between Thomistic and modern
conceptions of what it means to philosophise, and therefore what it means to
philosophise about God. Any modern interpretation of the Five Ways must take
account of the difference between philosophizing about God which depends on an
epistemology built on principles of being and the philosophizing that does not. A
modem criticism of St. Thomas' conclusion that God does in fact emst must also be
a criticisrn of his philosophizing to that conclusion by way of first principle~.~"
In
this chapter we shall acquaint ourselves with first principles of intellect by inquiring
into the existence of natural or necessary judgments, and the causes of the evidence
and infallibility of these natural judgments.

213 Louis Marie Rgis, Epistemology, (New York: The Macmillan Company, 1959). p. 371. This work
is a single most exhaustive and comprehensive study of Thomistic epistemology. No serious study of
St. Thomas' metaphysics and natural theology can afford to ignore it. 1 shall therefore make frequent
recourse to it-
214 Before attempting t o criticise such philosophizing one would do well to ponder t h e following
observations in order better t o see what exactly he is setting out to criticise. "The obscurity
surrounding the origin of principles is exactly the sarne as that which partly hides their nature. It is
agreed that in the Thomistic epistemology the agent intellect [see n. 223, p. 115 below] immediately
conceives the principles by way of abstraction from sensible experience, and that is correct. it is
added, then, that the intellect sufices for this operation, t h a t it accomplishes it by its own natural
light ...And that too is correct, but i t is not the whole truth. St. Thomas is the Iess s c r ~ ~ p u l oabout
us
not taking anything away from nature as, completely filled with the presence of God, like air with
light, nature cannot be belittled without doing injury to t h e creator. Nothing can be denied to the
essence of a being that God has made to be what it is ... The intellect is not the divine light; if it were,
it would be God. But i t is a created product of that light, and in a finite way it expresses it and
imitates its excellence. Hence its capacity to discover in beings, which are also made in the image of
the divine ideas, the intelligible forms in which they participate. The agent intellect in itself has the
power to recognise outside itself the resemblance of the first cause, which is the source of al1
knowledge and intelligibility ... The universe we know is henceforth composed of things created in
the likeness of a God whose essence, that is to Say, the act of being, is a t once their origin and model.
T h e intellect that knows these things is itseIf the product and image of the same God. In this
doctrine, in which everything in nature is natural, but in which nature is essentially a divine product
and a divine image, i t can be said that nature itself is sacred. I t is not surprising t h a t the first
intelligible object an intellect of this sort discerns in such a real world is the primary notion of being,
and that with this origin this notion surpasses in every way the mind that conceives it." Gilson,
Christian Philosophy, pp. 69-72
What is a Principle?
Principle means literally beginning ('principium'), or the starting point. In
philosophy, as we have seen St. Thomas describe it in chapter five, this meaning of
principle takes on the most fundamental meaning; here the beginning or the starting
point is that of all reality because philosophy is that intellectual inquiry which seeks
to attain "clear, certain, evident knowledge of the ultimate reasons and causes,
interna1 and external, of things, as far as this can be reached by the natural powers of
the human mind."2" Other intellectual activities also seek reasons of things, but
only philosophy seeks reasons that lie at the bottom of everything. These reasons
are sometimes called principles and sometimes causes, and they are the answers to
the last mhy the human mind asks. As such they are the ultimate explanations of
everything every science inquires about, but they themselves are not explained by
anything else. St. Thomas points out that first principles must satisfy at least two
conditions: that it is impossible for us to be in error about them, and they be
absolutely (as opposed to hypothetically) true.

[First principles] are not acquired by demonstration or by any similar method, but i t cornes in a
sense by nature to the one having i t inasmuch it is naturally known and not acquired. [They]
become known through the natural Iight of agent intellect and they are not acquired by any
process of reasoning but by having their terms become known. This comes about by reason of the
fact that mernory is derived from sensible things, experience from memory, and knowiedge of
those t e m s from experience. And when they are known, common propositions of this kind,
which are the principles of the arts and sciences, become known. Hence it is evident that the
most certain or firmest principles should be such that there can be no error regarding it; that i t is
not hypothetical; and that it cornes naturally to the one having it?I6
Aristotle defines a principle as "the first from which a thing either exists or is
" divides principles into ontological, that by which a
generated or is k n ~ w n . " ~This
thing is or becomes, and logical, that by which a thing is known. To the former

"Michael Shailo, op. al., p. 3.

In I V Metaph., Iect. 6 . n. 599. The fact that, for St. Thomas. principles are indemonstrable and
naturally known,points out that for him God is not a first principle. For if he were, St. Thomas
would not exert the effort to demonstrate GOGin Five Ways.
71' Aristotle, Metaphysics, Bk. V, 1 10l3a 18-19. (GrinneIl, Iowa, 1979). p. 73
group belong the four causes we encountered in chapter three. The latter group is
divided into two subgroups: formative plinciples of the sciences, and regdative
plinciples of al1 tho~ght.~"
In this chapter we shail discuss in some detail the second
group of logical pnn ciples.

Natural or NecessaryJudgments
When ancient and medieval philosophers Say that sornething does this or that by
nature, or that something is natural to a thing, they do not have in mind the notion
of "mother" nature; they are not talking about t h e not-artificial. To Say that
something is natural to a thing is to Say that it belongs t o it by nature, that is, by its
own form or essence which makes it what it is. Thus for example to Say that
something is natural to a human personis to Say that it belongs to him insofar as he
is human, that he owes this or that characteristic t o his humanity. Such a
characteristic is for that reason also necessary to a human person, that is, he cannot
not have it and be human; t o Say that he has it by necessity is to Say that he has it by
nature which belongs to him by virtue of his human form or essence.
And so St. Thomas says, "universal consent to first principles is caused by that
likeness of nature in consequence of which we are al1 inclined toward the same
thing; thus, for instance, a11 sheep agree in considering a wolf as an enerr~y."~"Our
task in this section is to inquire into those human judgments which corne from this
natural inclination toward truth, an inclination that is a natural reaction of the
human intellect in response to its primary object which we now know to be being, or
that which al1 things have in comrnon, that by which they are actual and knowable.

218
For a discussion of these see Mercier, A Manual of Modem S c h o l d c ...Vol. 1, pp. 386-388.
219
St. Thomas Aquinas, De Spiritualibus Creaturis (On Spiritual Creatures), tram b y M.C.
Fitzpatrick and J.J. Wellmuth, (Milwaukee: Marquette, 1951).9, ad 14.
 The main characteristics of the operation of this natural inclination and appetite
are spontaneity, infallibility, and necessity. This operation of the human intellect is
detmined by human nature, and it differs from the free operation of the intellect,
namely the operation of deliberating and of choosing, which is an operation that due
to its indetemination is susceptible to errer?'
But can Our acts of knowing be said to include natural operations, that is, is part
of our knowing non-deliberative or is al1 our knowledge a result of deliberation? In
order to answer, St. Thomas thinks we must first notice that "each power of the sou1
is a form or a nature, and has a natural inclination to something. Hence, each power
desires, by natural appetite, that object which is suitable to itseZJn2' The object of a
power is nothing but its natural goal, that toward which i t tends by virtue of its
form. The intellect is a power that apprehends being and natures (essences) of
things. In doing so it is simply obeying the law of nature according to which each
power tends toward its natural goal. This natural tending of the intellect toward the
being and essence of things is its act of simple apprehending, and no judgment is
involved. In the same way sight sirnply apprehends the visible and hearing the
audible, and al1 such apprehensions of the intellect and sense powers are infallible in
grasping their objects because the objects are connatural with the powers.
I see no reason why we should disagree with St. Thomas on this point.
Whenever we encounter a thing, Our intellects immediately see, and without the
possibility of deception, that it is a being and that it is this or that kind of thing.
Sometimes, not very often, we are not sure what kind exactly the thing is; it may be
living or non-living, animal or plant, and so on, but this we soon determine by
further apprehension, (not by deliberation). But that any object of our intellect is a
being is always and immediately apprehended.

220
SeeST, I,q. 19,a. 10;q.83,a.2;q.116,a. 1; 1-II,q. 12,a.S,ad3; II-I1,q. fB,a.4.
221
ST,1, q. 80, a. 1, ad 3. (itdics mine)
 Our main question, however, is whether this law of nature which the intellect
obeys when it knows by simple apprehension, it also obeys when i t makes
judgments." The Theologian says yes.

In every man there is a certain principle of knowledge, narnely the light of the agent [active]
intellect, through which certain universal principles of al1 sciences are naturalZg understood as
pmposed to the ~ i t e l l e c t . ~

And he explains how it is that the intellect produces infallible and self-evident
natural judgments.

First principles become known through the naturd Iight of the agent inteilect, and they are not
acquired by any process of reasoning, but by having their terms become known. This cornes
about by reason of the fact that memory is derived from sensible things, experience from

"Scholastic medieval theologians regarded judgment in the following ways: "a. an act of the mind
combining two objective concepts in an affirmation or separating them in a negation; an act of the
mind assenting to the known objective identity or difference of concepts. b. an act of the mind
asserting or denying existence of some subject (it is sometimes calIed an existential judgrnent). c. an
affirmation or denial of some conclusion." Bernard Wuellner Dictionary of Scholastic Philosophy,
(Milwaukee: The Bruce PubIishing Co., 1956),p. 65.
" ST, 1, q. 117, a. 2. (italics mine).
A brief account of what St. Thomas. following Aristotle, rneans by agent and possible intellect should
be given a t this point because we shall often refer to them throughout this work. R.E. Brennan sums
up the account in a way that pertains closely to our discussion. "Aristotle recognises in human
intelligence a dual power: first the ability to abstract; second, the ability to understand. Aquinas
takes over the Stagirite's distinction and makes it the basis of his own ideogenetic theory. The ability
to abstract he calls agent intellect. The ability to understand he names possible intellect. The functions
of agent intellect are active or creative. The functions of passive intellect are passive or receptive.
The proper object of sense is a sensible. But a sensible is only potentially intelligible. As a datum of
sense, it is material. In order to be understood, it must be made immaterial. The datum of sense is
presented to agent intellect in the form of an image of phantasm. It has al1 the concrete characters of
a material object. It is the product of a material power, enveloped in material conditions. It belongs
to the category of the here and now. It is, in short, individualised. The act of illumination, which is
proper to agent intellect, is brought to bear on the phantasm. The concrete characters of the datum
of sense are left aside. This is the movement of abstraction. Only the nude nature of the object
represented in the phantasm remains. But a nude nature, or a nature stripped of its individuating
notes, is something capable of being understood. The content of the phantasm is no longer material
and deterrninate but has been raised to the level of inteIIigibility.
Thus, the work of agent intellect is t o illumine and abstract, and, in very act of illuminating and
abstracting, to change the object of sense into an object of intellect. The effect of its creative
functioning is to produce a species which, by virtue of its immaterial action, c m fecundate possible
intellect with the germ of knowledge. The task of possible intellect, however, is not o d y to receive
and be fecundated, but also to produce in its own right; and so it gives expression to its
representational power by forrning a species of its own. This species is the idea or concept." Thomistic
Psychology (New York: The Macmillan Company, 1941). pp. 179-180.
 memory, and knowledge of terms from experience. And when they are known, comrnon
propositions of this kind, which are the principles of the arts and sciences, become known. Hence
it is evident that the most certain and firmest principle should be such that there can be no error
regarding it; that it is not hypothetical; and that it cornes naturally to the one having it.ZM

W e see, then, that some of Our judgments are natural operations, because they are
the actualization of a power our intellect has by virtue of its nature or essence. This
power of our intellect is called agent intellect, and its function is t o shed light on
whatever is real; in other words, i t makes being known to us. But t o what in the
human mind does agent intellect make being known, on what does it shed the light
of the real? To another natural power called the possible i n t e l l e ~ t . ~

But the possible intellect which, like prime rnatter is of itself undetermined, neeck a habitus to
make sure that it follows its right rule: i t needs a natural habit to grasp determinations like first
principles, determinations which are the effects of the agent intellect which is its nile; a d it
needs an acquired habit for everything which may be derived from these principlesz16

First principles are, therefore, determinations or first judgments, and they are the
necessary consequence of the two natural powers of Our mind, and because first
judgments have the characteristics of natural operations, they are immediate or
sudden, acquired wit hout inquiry or investigation, indemonstrable, and necessary.
Next, we must see what are the causes of the first judgments of which our human
nature is the immediate cause, that is, we must see the objects of these judgments,
the concepts in which they consist, and how these concepts are linked which forces
the intellect to unite them in judgment, which is its acquired habit.

The Number and Character of the Naturally Known First Judgments

Why are first judgments called principies or starting points, and how many are
there? The phraseJint principles is somewhat redundant because a pnnciple is that
which is first. "That is said to be a principle which comes first either with reference

224 ITZIV Metaph., lect. 6, n. 599.

ZLS ~ e n.e 223 above.

zsRgis op., cit. pp. 376-7. cf. St. Thomas Aquinas, Commentary on the Sentences of Peter Lombard,
book I I I , 23,1,1-5,24, 1,l-2.
to a thing's being (as the first part of a thing is said to be a principle) or with
reference to its coming t o be (as the first mover is said to be a principle) or with
reference to the knowing of it."" We thus have three orders of real things of which
i t can be said that they have a first principle: the being of things, the becoming of
things, and the knowledge of things. Now it is in the order of the knowledge of
things that we speak of judgments as first principles.
But how can there be several first principles, for first implies only one? In the
order of knowledge "the expression first pn'nciples must be understood tu mean a
group of judgments by which the intellect observes the existence of necessary bonds
between several primary concepts, bonds that oblige i t to i d e n t i S them in
affirmation and separate them in negation.""~nd what is the main characteristic of
this group of natural judgments which are known to everyone before he even knows
what a judgment is? To Say that a thing is known to everyone is to Say that it is self-
evident in the sense that "its predicate is contained in the notion of the subject ...
and such are those propositions whose terms are known to all, as, every whole is
greater than its part."Pg But before the human intellect apprehends any other
notion naturally known and common to all, it apprehends the notion of b h g , which
is a term "understood by everyone ... for being is the first concept in the intellect.
Hence it is necessary that propositions of this kind [whose predicate is contained in
the subject] be held as known in virtue of themselves [as opposed to demonstrated]
not only as they stand but also in reference to us."m On being the first and most
basic notion, other notions are based, notions like one and rnany. Furthermore, from
this indemonstrable and first notion, which is for that reason a principle, and from

I" In V Metuph., lect 1, n. 761.This entire lecture, and lect. 6 In I V Metaph., serve as an excellent
introduction to the Thomistic understanding and importance of principles, causes, and elements.
2~ Rgis, op. cit., p. 378.
229
ST,1-11, q. 94, a. 2.
In I Post. Anaiyt., Iect. 5. (Albany. NY, 1970). p. 21.
the other universal and primitive notions which are consequent upon being, arise
This is a key point in the philosophy
first indemonstrable principles or judgment~.~'
of St. Thomas; it is a point we may wish to dispute, or ignore, but without it we
cannot understand why St. Thomas thinks his Five Ways demonstrate that God
does in fact existe
The principles comprise a list of ten: (1) It does not occur that the same thing is
and is net? (2) It is impossible for a thing both to be and not to be at the same
tirne? (3) Each thing is one with itself." (4) One should not affirm and deny the
same thing? (5) Every subject whatsoever must be either affirmed or denied? ( 6 )
Affirmation and negation are not simultaneously truc? (7) It is impossible that
contradictories be simultaneously t r ~ e (8)
. ~ Whatever the subject, either
affirmation o r negation is truc?' (9) Every thing in motion is necessarily being
rnoved by some thing." (10) Every agent acts for an end?'

231
For St. Thomas' more detailed account of this see In IV Metaph, the entire lect 6.
" ~ e e In I Post. AnaZyt., lect. 5. nn. 7-8; lect. 19, n. 1; In IV Metaph., lect. 6. n. 606; In I Phys., lect. 6,
nn. 7-8.
=Sec In III Metaph., lect. 5, n. 387,392; In IV Metnph., lect. 600,603,605-606.
23.1
See In VII Metaph., lect. 17, nn. 1652-1657; In IV Metaph., lect. 2, n. 566; In X Metaph; lect. 4, nn.
1997-1998,2006,2014-2017.
= ~ e eIn I Post. Anal*, lect. 20. nn. 1-2; ST. 1-11. q. 94, a 2.
=Sec In III Metaph., lect. 5, n. 387; In IVMetaph., lect. 7, n. 626: lect. 16, n. 720;In XI Metaph., lect.
5, nn. 2221-2223.
ZR See In I Post. AnaZyt., lect. 5, n. 6; lect. 20, nn. 1-2; In IV Metaph., lect. 7; In XI Metaph., lect. 5-6.

See In I Post AnaZzjt., lect. 5, n. 5 ; In II Metaph., lect. 5-6. St. Thomas defines contradiction this
way: "an opposition of affirmation and negation; hence one part of a contradiction is affirmation,
which asserts something of something, and t h e other is negation, which denies something of
something." In IPost. Analyt., lect. 5, n. 5.
See l n I Post. Analyt., lect. 5, n. 5; lect. 20, n. 3; In I V Metaph., lect. 16-17. This principle is often
referred to as the principle of excluded middle. See In X Metaph., lect. 6, n. 2041; De Pot., q. 1, a. 3.
e VII Metaph., lect. 7, nn. 1440-1446; ST, 1, q. 2. a. 3; SCG,1, 13-15. That causdity is a self-
z O ~ e In
known evidence contained in every movement, see In IiPhys., Iect. 5, n. 17.
U1
See ST,1, q. 5, a. 4; De Pot., q. V, a. 5; De Ver.,QQ. XXI-XXIL
 It is not difficult to see that neither the content nor the formulation of this list of
judgments can be identified, that is, they do not point to this or that thing in reality.
It is the job of the philosopher, not to provide proof of evidence and truth of the first
judgments, which would be absurd, but to show their primacy and infallibility by
considering closely their subjects and predicates. Rgis rnaintains that they .

comprise four groups, that is, they can be understood as belonging to one or more of
the four groups: (1) the principle of non-contradiction, (2) the principle of identity,
(3) the principle of causality, and (4) the principle of finality.
Even though i t would be beneficial to us to consider closely al1 four groups, we
can afford the space to consider only the last two. The question, however, is whether
causality and finality are principles, in the epistemological sense of a first principle
that does not follow from a set of prior premises, or whether their necessity and
universality must first be firmly established. Scholars like Rgis, Renard, and
Maritain think they are the former, while Owens, Klubertanz, and Smith take the
other side. But neither side of the controversy denies that the truth of causality and
finality c m be established beyond doubt. In other words, the manner in which St.
Thomas thinks the human intellect arrives at the truth of causality and finality may
be disputed, but that it does arrive at it, and that this t m t h is an integral part of an
argument for God's existence, is not a matter of dispute.

Causality
According to Rgis causality is a principle which encompasses the last two of our
ten axioms. The universality of these, and their function in human knowledge, is
different from those that belong to the principles of non-contradiction and identity.
They differ in that they are directly concerned with being in the process of
becoming, and being as becoming is the first and proper object of the human
intellect. I t is by means of these two principles that our intellect is able to make
contact with the existence and intelligibility of that aspect of being which is not
immediate to Our reason, namely beingas becoming. The axioms of the principles of
noncontradiction and identity, which are imrnediate t o our reason, deal with being
and nonbeing, but to Say that they "deal" with them is not to Say that they help the
human intellect to get in touch, so to speak, with either being o r nonbeing; they do
not help the intellect t o grasp this or that object of reality. Through them the
intellect contemplates being in its fullness and as absolutely universal. I t is only by
means of causality and finality that the human intellect gets in touch with realities
that are remote from its immediate horizons-being as becoming, being that does not
have in itself the ground of its existence, or being that does not exist of itself?
Causality viewed as a principle, Rgis maintains, can be restated in one general
and al1 encompassing way: Euerything contingent is caused, which cari again be
restated in three specific ways corresponding to three types of contingency that
characterise being as becoming "1)that of physical motion, in which the principle is
stated thus: Everything moved is moved by another; 2) that of efficiency or
rnetaphysical motion, and the principle here is stated in this way: Every efficient
action which is a passage from potency to act, is caused; 3) that of existence, where
we have the third statement: Everything that is not its own act of existing is
caused.
As a first judgment or a principle, the statement euerything contingent is cazcsed
must, according to Rgis, have the characteristic of self-evidency and infallibility.
To show that it does, a philosopher must show that its predicate is contained in the
notion of the subject. In our statement of the principle of causality the-thing-as-
contingent has the role of subject and the-thing-as-caused has the role of predicate.

za At least, this is how St. Thomas, following Aristotle, thinks t h e hurnan niind gets in touch with
the reai (being) and the knowable. Plato thinks the way is the reverse, narnely, that the mind begins
really to know when it exits the realrn of becoming. I shall Say more about this in chapter nine.
Rgis, op. ci& p. 395.
If we are to show that the principle of causality is self-evident and infallible, we
must show that the proposition a thing is contingent is the same as a thing is caused,
or it has a cause. The point may be put another way: it must be shown that the
notion of contingency is not intelligible without the notion of cause, and that
therefore the existence of the contingent requires the existence of a cause. Let us
therefore consider the correlation between being as contingent and being as caused,
between the subject and predicate of the principle of causality. We shall do this by
unpacking first the meaning of each phrase.
To Say that something is contingent is to Say that it happened or came abouc
consequently, it has not always been, it is that which can not-be. Philosophically
speaking, the contingent is that which is able to be other than it is, and also able not
to exist." The contingent may in fact be better understood as the rnutable and as
the opposite of the necessaryw
But a thing is contingent in three ways: in its movement, its substance or essence
(along with its actions or operations, which is to Say its efficiency) and in its
existence. Thus the subject of the principle of causality is being as mouable or
changing insofar as it is moving or changing, or because its activity or efficiency can
not-be, or because it comes in and goes out of existence. I t is easy to see the
contingency of a thing insofar as it moves or changes, but not so easy to see it in its
essence (and action) and existence. To help us see it there we must note that the
contingent is opposed not only to the necessary but also to a ~ tthat
, ~is, ~
to that act
which is autonomous, and not derived or received from another. An act is
autonomous and not derived when it belongs to a thing's essence, when a thing acts

"See In VI Metaph., lect. 2, nn. 1182-1183.

U5 The etymological meaning of necessaTy is clearer in Latin from which it comes. It is a negation, ne,
of cedo which has several different but related meanings: to go, to happen, t o change, to become. Thus
for a thing to be necessary it must be immobile, unchanging; it must be, not become.
26
See n. 265, p. 131below, for a definition of act.
because of what it is. Thus thinking is an act of a human being insofar as one is
human or has a human essence. Flying, on the other hand, is an action a human
being performs, not autonomously, but as derived from an aircraft. That is why the
properties of essences are said to be necessary. However, the existence of essences
and their properties is contingent because the essences have the properties they do
only because they receive them. Another way to Say that is this: even though it is
necessary that an essence be the essence it is, it is not necessary that this or that
essence be in the first place. Thus even though an act springing from a thing's
essence is autonomous, a thing's essence is contingent, and that makes its act
necessary only secondarily. And this brings us to the third type of contingency-the
contingency of the act of existing of this or that individual essence. Realizing that
an essence is contingent, that is, dependent upon another for its being at all, is to
realise that the root of contingency of al1 being as becoming resides in the very act of
existing. Thus in order to understand the principle of causality well (or as St.
Thomas says, properly) we shall have to see that contingency appears first in the act
of existing. That is why in chapter seven we shall attempt to get a glimpse of that
act and to say more about its primacy. For now, let it suffice to note that the
existence of everything Our intellects encounter is contingent, that is, every thing we
know can not-be.
In trying to understand the meaning of being as caused, the predicate of the
principle of causality, we cannot make much use of the etymology of the word cause
for it is historically largely undetermined."" Philosophically, however, a cause of a

2" A.E. Taylor, however, may help us to begin understanding the meaning of cause. He says char the
Greek word Aristotle used for "cause" is aitia, aition. Aition is properly an adjective used
substantivally, and means "that on which legd responsibility for a given state of affairs can be laid."
Similarly aitia, the substantive, means the %reditn for good or bad, the legd "responsibility" for an
act. Now when we ask, "what is responsible for the fact that such and such a state of things now
exists?", the answer or answers given is a "cause". Aristotle, (New York: Dover Publications, Inc.,
1955). p. 50.
being is one of four things, two of which refer to a thing's constitutive element,
namely its matter and form, and two that express its origin, orientation, and various
activities, namely the efficient and final causes. In al1 its uses and references the idea
of cause always entails the notion of some sort of dependence. Given that we are
dealing with the contingency of being (being as able not to be), rather than with the
constitutive elements of this or that being, the principle of causality applies only
insofar as it exerts its influence on efficiency and finality, and insofar as the intellect
uses it to explain the contingency of things in the order of existing.
We are now in the position to state the rneaning of being as cause& it is being or
the real in its dependence upon that which is other than itself-that which does not
belong to its inner resources (that which it is not but has) and which it therefore
does not intrinsically possess but by which it is possessed, so to speak, and from
which it continually receives, insofar as it is caused? But, as we have already seen,
contingent being receives or is caused in the realm of its physical becoming (the
realm of the changes that accrue to it as a composite of matter and form), in the
realm of its passing from potency to act in order of action or operation, and in the
realm of existing (the realm of coming into being and remaining in being for a time).
Thus the principle of causality deals with al1 movement and mutability of
everything that is dependent on another for its being and action (efficiency).
Let us now look more closely a t the correlation between the subject and the
predicate of the principle of causality. The rneaning of the subject or being as
contingent is this: Whatever is contingent (whatever is in process of physical or
metaphysical becoming and whose act of existing does not arise from its own
resources but receives it over and above its essence) is dependent upon another for

"The importance of this point is pivotal for understanding how St. Thomas views the data from
which he argues to God in the Five Ways. W e shall stress the point several times throughout the
course of our preparation for a profitable reading of the Five Ways.
its becoming and existing. But t o be dependent amounts to being possessed by,
being the property of, the one on whom we depend, because in sharing what belongs
to the one on whom we depend, we have no claim to independence from him insofar
as we participate in what belongs properly to him and which we lack. Thus, in the
context of contingency, dependence on another entails having a borrowed being and
a borrowed efficiency. But it is precisely here that the meaning of the subject is
contained in the meaning of predicate, that is, to Say that being is contingent is to
Say that it is caused. "To Say that everything contingent is caused is to affirm
immediate and per se evidence, for caused being is intrinsically contained in
contingent; without each other they are unintelligible.""It matters little what type
of the contingency we are speaking of; the principle of causality (everything
contingent is caused) is self-evident because in each case the same contingency is at
work, namely, to receive from and to participate in another is t o be and to be
intelligible only in relation t o the other, which is its cause.
Rgis also insists on a two-fold epistemoIogica1 self-evidency of the principle of
causality. First, given that the bond between the subject and the predicate of the
principle of causality is an essential bond, because the notion of contingency is
defined in terms of the fact of its causal dependence, it is impossible, therefore, to
think of contingency apart from its relation to its explanatory cause. To understand
the principle of causality is to see the necessary and self-evident character of its
truth, which is this: if sornething is contingent, it is necessarily caused; put more
clearly, it is this: "it is impossible that everything contingent not be caused, for the
contingent needs a cause just as potency needs act.""
The necessity of the truth of the principle of causality can also be seen in
contrast to the principle of noncontradiction (being is not nonbeing). A denial of the

Rgis, op. cir., p. 398.

"fiid. p. 399.
necessity of the truth of the principle of causality forces the intellect into a n
absurdity of denying the truth of the principle of noncontradiction. How so? If
whatever is contingent is not necessady caused, then that which is essentially
potency, namely the contingent, is not necessarily potency. But this drives us into
an absurdity, because if the contingent or that which is potency is not necessarily
potency, then that which is not act is act, because potency is that which is not act;
and if that which is not act is act, then nonbeing is being, because act is being.
Therefore it is not only nonsensical to deny the principle of causality, it is also
absurd."'
But Rgis' position on causality reveals only one side of a scholarly controversy.
In his article, "The Causal Proposition-Principle or Conclusion?" Joseph Owens
does not deny the truth of causality but calls into question its self-evident and
analytic character. Owens argues that it is more authentically Thomistic to regard
the causal proposition as a conclusion rather then a p r i n c i p l e . H e insists on the
following point: Even though we come to see that something has come into being,

a' Henri Renard supports the clairn that the principle of causality is analytical and absolutely
certain in the following way. "Let us start with the first incornplex principle 'being. Our next step in
the light of logical development will be the principle of contradiction, or, as it is sometimes called,
the principle of identity: 'Being is being; non-being is non-being.' Now the first half of that
proposition 'being is being' can be thus expressed: 'Whatever is, is' o r whatever is must have a
sufficient reason to be.' This is sometimes called the principle of sufficient reason. The subject of that
proposition is every and al1 beings, and hence includes God and al1 creatures. We can omit the first
half, for 'God who is subsisting to be is His own reason for existence [which is to say that He does not
require a causai explanation].' The second half of the principle should then read: 'Creatures, on the
contrary, who are not their to be, but have a to be really distinct from their essence are not a sufficient
reason for existence to themselves. Consequently, they must have a sufficient reason for existing from
another.' This is Our principle of causality." The Philosophy of Being, (Milwaukee: The Bruce
Publishing Company, 1946). p. 126.
" ~ e o r ~ Klubertanz
e suggests that causality should be referred t o as a theorem rather than a
principie. Both he and Owens warn against a view of causality prevalent in modern phiIosophy and
in neo-scholasticism of the twentieth century which regards it as "'self evident' from the very
analysis of the concepts or [as a deduction] from the principle of suffcient reason." nstead,
Klubertanz insists, causality is "a proposition of a very general and inclusive character, whose t m t h
can be established beyond a doubt. Such a proposition is called a 'principle,' 'law,' or 'theorem.'"
Introduction to the Philosophy of Being, (New York: Meredith Publishing Co., 1963)' p. 154, n. 11.
and have thereby established that it is contingent, we cannot immediutely attach to
the notion "contingent" the notion "caused." But until we have joined "contingent"
and "caused", universally and necessarily, we cannot assert, by way of conclusion,
that something contingent must as such be caused. "Before one can invoke such an
application of the first principle of demonstration, one must have already
established the contingent thing as necessarily a caused thing."*
But we saw that Rgis insists on the self-evident and analytic character of
causality only aber- he restates it as everything contingent is caured. But Owens
argues that the necessary and universal connection between the contingent and the
c a d must first be established. The two positions are therefore not reconcilable.
The reason why the connection between the contingent and the caused must first
be established, at least in Thomistic philosophy, is that St. Thomas is not a
rationalist who p hilosophises on the basis of clear and distinct ideas attained
without recourse to sensible things. In other words, the notion caused cannot be
seen as immediately evident in the notion contingent, because "this latter notion is
taken From the things of the sensible universe. It is a notion considerably different
from that of 'contingent,' and when used as a middle terrn" it seems to rnake the
process a strict demonstration. The causal proposition would become a conclw-on
from other premises instead of being episternologicalIy a first p r i n ~ i p l e . " ~

2a Joseph Owens. "The Causal Proposition-Principle o r Conclusion?" Modem Schoofman, 32

(January, t955), p. 169. In another of his works Owens explains a metaphysical understanding of the
causal proposition this way. "The causal proposition in a metaphysical context is considerably
different from what is understood by the principle of causality o r the principle of causation in
modern physical science, where it denotes t h e uniformity of nature. T h e meaning then is 'same cause,
same effect.' ... Metaphysically, the causal proposition on the contrary bears upon the existence, cot
the nature, of the effect. I t means that every finite thing or action, whether determined or free, has to
have a cause of its being." An Elmenta y Chrrrtian Metaphpics,p. 77, n. 19
For a definition of midde t m see n. 373, p. 205 below.
"j~ w e n s"The
, Causal Proposition...", p. 259.
 Consequently, in the philosophy of St. Thomas, the causal proposition is
formulated at its most basic metaphysical level at the very moment when we see
that a being whose existence is not owed to its essence receives existence from
another that lies outside of it. But because for a human being the data for
knowledge, which is being, cornes from sense experience, knowledge that efficient
causality is actually here and now taking place is a posteriori, and therefore not
analytic, and not a principle but a conclusion. To see that a being whose existence is
not owed to its essence must receive its existence from another is for St. Thomas a
conclusion of a demonstration. Only upon reaching this conclusion are we entitled
to employ the causal proposition euerything contingent is caused (which means
euerything contingent is caused to exist). Owens lays o u t the steps of the
dernonstration which reaches this conclusion.

The first step in that demonstration is to show that a thing abstracts from its being without
prescinding from it. This itself is a difficult demonscration in which the nature of the thing is
compared with its different ways of being, The being which is attained in the judgment and
which is other than nature is used as the middle term. The second step is t o show that the being
of a thing is accidentai to it, not in the sense of a property or a predicamenlal accident, which
wouId be subsequent to the nature, but in the sense of an accident which is in its own way
absolutely prior to the nature. The notion of accident in this sense is used as a middle terrn. The
conclusion is that to be for such a nature is ab alio [from another]. This is the causal proposition.
Further reasoning establishes the relation of act and potency and sets up the concept of ail being
except the primary being as "participated being." In that concept, of course, the concept of
"caused" is involved .... Where, in c o n t r a t [to modern rationalist background], sensible things
are the origin of al1 human knowledge and where things are of a nature which is different from,
but always open to, the act of being, they provide the basis for a rigorous demonstration in which
the causal proposition follows as a conclusion from the accidental character of their being.256

Owens concludes that we ought stay clear of regarding the causal proposition as
anal'tic in order to avoid confusion with the Kantian sense of that term. The
proposition the contingent is caused is not like the proposition all bachelors are single
because the term caused refers here to efficient causality, not formal causality. In the
proposition al1 bachelors are single the universally accepted meaning of bachelor is
presupposed. Not so in the order of efficient causality. That is, "the demonstration of

256 Ibid. pp. 335 and 339.

the causal proposition does not presuppose that the proposition has already been
implicitly accepted through the use of syllogistic r e a s ~ n i n g . "If,
~ then, we wish to
refer to causality as a principle, Owens points out, we must do so bearing in mind
that it is a proposition whose necessity and universality are demonstrated, and
therefore a principle in a non-epistemological sense, not a first principle like the
principle of contradiction.
Owens is well aware that the concepts of cause and e f f c t are immediately
evident to the human intellect, that is, through internal experience. "They are
generalised by an easy and habitua1 process, which becomes as i t were a second
nature, and so are extended to al1 contingent things."= Smith, who agrees that the
causal proposition must be demonstrated, elaborates on the immediate evidency of
the concept of cause or causality. Because this concept follows immediately upon
internal experience, the following is necessarily true: X must be either caused or
uncaused; it cannot be neither. Smith explains.
Causality is a principle, a source, a reason why there is an existent only when examination
reveals that the existent examined must [that is, once the necessary connection between the
contingent and the caused has been demonstrated] be caused. Causaiity is a principle of caused
being, not a principle of being, and that a being be caused must be demonstrated. In short, "to be
caused" is a predicate of a being when it is proved that a being is caused, pretty much as "odd" or
"even" is a predicate of a number only after examination has shown whether the number is odd or
even.259
In other words, the notion of causality does not have much traction, that is, it
does not yield much knowledge, until a rnetaphysical examination has revealed that
a being is in fact caused. Or, as Owens puts it, "the causal proposition has a very

?rs Ibid. p. 336. On the inner experience of cause see J. Piaget. The Child's Conception of Causality,
(London: Kegan Paul, Trench, Trubner & Co., 1930).
299 Smith, The Philosophy of Being, p. 13. Cf. "The fact that something is a nose does not show that it
is snub; the fact that something is a number does not show that it is even. In a word, although the
notion "causednrnight not be found in anything other than the contingent, it would not immediately
guarantee that everything contingent must be caused. That wouId still have t o be demonstrated
through peculiarly accidental character in the being of such contingent things." Owens, "The Causal
Proposition," pp. 336-337, n. 95.
limited use in a philosophy which ... places the origin of human cognition in sensible
t h i n g ~ . "Nevertheless
~ the meaning of the notion of causality is immediately
known. If i t were not, no one could see the absolute an indemonstrable truth of the
following proposition: X rntcst be either caused or uncaused; it cannot be neithm. It
simply is not an option to demand, with respect to that proposition, "Why can it not
be neither?" I t is no more an option than t o demand a demonstration of a .

proposition saying that a number cannot be neither odd nor even. To speak of a
number is to speak of an either odd or an even number. In the same way, t o speak of
a being is speak of an either caused or an uncaused being. To determine which we
are speaking of requires a conclusion that issues only upon a demonstration. Smith
merely points out that we cannot argue for causality itself. That is, it is impossible
to demonstrate that a being cannot be neither caused nor uncaused, or that it must
be one or the other, because causality issues upon being. The truth of that
proposition is self-evident because causality, as a principle of caused being, is not and
cannot be proved. This does not, however, lend credence to the rationalist principle
of sufficient reason because it does not get us off the hook of having to demonstrate,
through the steps we saw Owens outline above, that some sensible thing is
necessady related to its efficient cause. In another of his works Smith makes the
point in more detail.
Al1 proofs are from causality [that is, from the imrnediate, not a priori, notion of cause and
caused]. No proof based upon causality proves causality. In fact, causality is not proved a t ail. If
proof proves, there is no proof that it does. If, e.g., this be proof: there is x, because there is y;
nevertheless there is no proof of that. Causality is the b a i s of proof and an eduction from the
principle of contradiction. The principle of contradiction is itself a natural induction from
experience. Thus, causality [not the causal proposition] is not proved, it is seen as being the only
explanation of a contingent existent, which existent, evidenced as it is by experience [and not by
analysis], wouId be and not be a t the same time unless i t were caused. To prove is to see, in the
light of the principle of causaiity, either that there must be the effect, because there is the cause;
or that there must be the cause, because there is the effect. There is no demonstration by middle
term of the principle of causality [that is, of the immediate notion of cause, not of t h e causal
proposition] ...The relevant point is that such principles are der-ived from the knowledge of being

"~ w e n s"The
, Causal Proposition," p. 339.
 in such wise that if they were not so derived, then one must quit thinking, because anything to
think about has quit being. No first principles are proved. It is in the light of unproved principles
that conclusions are proved. As St. Edrnund Campion remarked... 'Tobias had a dog, although
the Bible says only that Tobias' dog wagged his tail.' That is,... you can prove Tobias had a dog if
there is an unproved. but known waggle; or you can prove a waggle if there is an unproved, but
known do . You cannot prove anything without the datum of being and the principles derived
therefrom.%3
This does not in any way contradict Owens who takes it as his task t o show
"how a thing necessarily contains a relation to an efficient cause which produced it,
even though that efficient causality is not immediately evidentlnmand argues that
the necessity of the relation becomes evident only upon a demonstration, and not, as
Rgis argues, upon a n analysis of the concept contingent. He does not argue,
however, that the relation becomes intelligible upon a demonstration. Smith's point
is that the intelligibility of the relation between the efficient cause and that which is
produced by the efficient cause is indemonstrable, because it issues upon the already
possessed and unproved notion of causality which itself issues upon the interna1
experience of being, the source of everything known and knowable.
At this point an important question anses. Why does a philosopher at al1 inquire
whether an existent is caused? The short answer is this: being an existent is a status
that belongs to many existents, each of which is not another existent, and we need
to account for the rnultiplicity of existents, which, although they are al1 existents
(and in that respect the same) are nevertheless many e d t e n t s , that is, one is not the
other (and in that respect they are different)? In chapter eight we shall examine

"' Smith, Naturd Theo[ogy,(New York: The Macmillan Company, 1951). pp. 58-59
?B Owens, "The Causal Proposition," p. 160, n. 1.
263
That St. Thomas insists on this is clear from the following text: "But being is predicated of
everything that is. Hence, there cannot possibly be two things neither of which has a cause of its
being, but either both of them must exist through a cause, or the one must be the cause of the other's
being. Everything which is in any way at al1 must then derive its being from that whose being has no
cause.... Again, everything that can be and not-be has a cause; for considered in itself it is indifferent
to either, so that something else must exist which determines it to one. Since, then, it is impossible to
go on to infinity, there must exist a necessary being which is the cause of al1 things that can be and
not-be." SCG,II, 15,2 and 6.
this level of sameness and difference, unity and multiplicity, in the only way it can
be examined, that is metaphysicdly.

Finality
Rgis and Renard argue for an understanding of finality in the same way in
which they argue for causality-that it is axiomatic or a self-evident principle. As
their staking point they take St. Thomas' claim that "every agent of necessity acts
for an end."" This judgment may be translated being as agent is finaliseci, which
gives us the subject of the proposition: being as agent, and the predicate: being as
finalised. We shall examine them separately, and then show their correlation.
What for St. Thomas is an agent? We are not here concerned, as we were in the
principle of causality, with being in potency, or as contingent, or as a recipient; we
are interested here in being, not as receiving, but as giving or communicating
whatever flows from its inner wealth, fiom a perfection that belongs to it.

1 answer that it is in the nature of every act to comrnunicate itself as far as possible. Wherefore
every agent acts forasmuch as it is in act: while to act is nothing else than to communicate as far
as possible that whereby the agent is in act.=

261
ST, 1-11, q. 1, a. 2. See also The PnBciples of Nature, ed. cit., IV, 23: "The end is said to be the cause
of causes, inasmuch as it is the cause of the causaiity of al1 the causes."
=De Pot.. q. II, a. 1, c. See also De Ver.,q. XX.a. 4 and SCG, III. 10.
The Scholastic notion of agency presupposes a rather complex notion of act. As a verb, to a d ,
meant for the Schoiastics: 1) to do or to rnake something. 2) to cause something to be in act, whether
by way of efficient, final, or forma1 causality. As a noun act can be understood in the general sense
and as rnanifesting itself in many specific ways. Generdly speaking a c t means 1) perfection or a
perfection; what is fully real, finished, or fdfiliing; an actuality. 2) thought of as infiencingpotency in
some way, a determining principle; the intrinsic principle which confers a definite perfection on
being; hence, a form. 3) the perfection resulting from an action. 4 ) activity, operation, action, or
second act of a power. ANT. - potency. Some of the more important specific aspects of a c t are:
complete act, an end or an operation that is an end; the ultimate act of a being (the last in a series of
acts by which a being obtains its proper fullness of being). entitative act, existence; the act of being;
esse. first act, 1) the intrinsic fundamental perfection of a being in any order. 2) the first actuality (in
a series) that determines any passive potency to be or to be something specific. Hence, the sarne
being may have several first acts, but each in different orders; existence will be first act in the order of
being, substantial forrn will be first in the order of essence or nature, the power will be first in the
order of activity. second act, a deterrnination or perfection added to a being which already possesses
A technical definition of agent being is being h o f u r as it is perfect or in second
act.= To speak of a being's perfection is to speak of some good, some definite

actuaiity which belongs to and is suitable to that being. To Say that a perfection is a
second act is to Say that it is added to a being which already possesses first acts in
different orders, that is, existence, form (for example, a soul in the case of a human
being), and powers belonging to that form (for example, the intellect and the wili
which bear the fruits of knowledge and love respectively). To be an agent, therefore,
is to be perfect, to be perfect in proportion to the intensity of the agent's act. Thus,
the more intensely one is in act, that is, the less admixture of act and potency there
is in him, the more he approximates the absolute agent or the agent in whorn there is
no potency (no capacity to receive existence, forrn, or a power). To act, then, is to
express or comrnunicate that perfection which belongs to a being's actuality.
The Thomistic meaning of the predicate of the principle of finality, being as
finahed, can be seen in the Theologian's earliest work.

I answer that something acts for an end in two ways: either for the end of the work, or for the end
of the worker. The end of the work is that to which the work is directed by the agent, and this is
caIIed the ratio of the work [that which is intelligible in the work; the reason or the 'why' of it];
but the end of the worker is that tvhich the worker primarily intends: whereas the end of the
work can be in another; the end of the worker is always in himself... It is known therefore that
acting for an end is of two modes: either on account of the desire for the end, or on account of the
love of the end: for one desires a thing he does not posses, but loves the thing he does possess ...
and for this reason i t is fitting for every creature to act on account of the desire of the end,
because every creature acquires frorn another the good which it does not have from itself; but it
belongs to God to act on account of the love of the end, because nothing can be added to his
goodness [perfection] .m
From this we see that to act for an end has two meanings: 1) if the end is desired, the
act irnplies an imperfection, namely the lack of that which is desired, 2) if the end is

the first act, whether of existence o r of form or of a particular power; e.g., intellect and will with
respect to the soul itself; acts of the will with respect to the will itself; accidents of a substance.
Hence, a second act presupposes and perfects another act, and is usually an accident. Dictionary of
Scholastic Philosophy, p. 3.
ass Rgis, op. cit,p. 400.
St. Thomas Aquinas, Srriptum super libros Sententiamrn, In II Sent., 1, 2, 1. (Paris: Mandonnet,
1929). (my own translation)
loved, the act implies a perfection because it is the act of giving entirely without an
expectation of return or any interest. But both meanings contain the notion of a gift.
In the first case the gift is the effect of an act that is received by the acting being,
and in the second case the gik is an outpouring of a perfect actuality into effects
that are themselves givers. To act for an end, therefore, means to be a being that
gives or communicates itself, which is love. But t hat, as we have seen, is also the
meaning of the subject of the principle of finality, beng as agent.
We may thus restate the principle of finality in several different ways: "it is
necessary that every agent act in virtue of an end; it is necessary that actuality
communicate actuality; it is impossible that being as perfect communicate anything
but perfection; i t is impossible that perfect being act in view of a nongood or not be
finali~ed."~
As with the principle of causality, the necessity of the truth of the principle of
finality can be seen when it is reduced to the principle of noncontradiction. To deny
the necessity of an agent's acting for an end is to deny that being is not nonbeing, or
to affirm that being is nonbeing. How so? Being an agent means being in second act
or perfect, and end means the perfection of the real (in Latin perfectio means a
completion, therefore that which is finished or ended). Now, as we shall see in the
next chapter, existing is the ultirnate perfection of a being. From this it follows that
if a thing is an agent on account of the fact that it is an existent, and if it is an end on
account of the fact that it is a perfection (which is to Say an existent), it must
necessarily be the case that an agent acts for an end; for if not, we are forced to
maintain that a perfect being is not a perfect being which contradicts the principle
of identity, which again denies the truth of the principle of noncontradiction. We

Rgis, op. cit., p. 402.

can conclude, therefore, that the principle of finality, which is grasped upon an
examination of its subject and predicate, is self-evident and necessary?
George Klubertanz, on the other hand, argues that finality is, for St. Thomas,
more of a conclusion than a principle, a conclusion of a real (rather than a logical)
proof which rests on Our direct experience of agents and their tendency. I t is true,
Khbertanz points out, that St. Thomas oken asserts e u e y agent acts for a goal
simply as a premise without demonstrating it, but he also presents i t as a conclusion
of an argument.

First, in the sense that every agent acts for something definite, [St. Thomas] proves the axiorn by
showing its contrary to be impossible, and by treating it in terms ofact and potency shows that
every goal musc be a definite one. Secondly, to show that an agent is ordered to a goal, he
employs the notions of nature ( d e n commenting Aristotle) and tendency as middle terms.
(Though "agent," nature," "tendency," and "goaln are terrns which imply each other, they are
distinct notions, not simply synonymous words. In this argument, St. Thomas insists that nature
(and tendency) are known immediately in sense experience as well as in Our experience of our
own activity. [Thus] "Every agent acts for a goal," is not a self-evident principle, nor a truth
known rom the logicaI implications of prior logicaI principles, but a conclusion of a real proof
resting on the imrnediate experience of nature and tend en^^.^
Al1 our commentators, however, agree that for St. Thomas eueq agent acts for a
goal is indisputably tme, and that agency (efficiency) carries with it finality. In
chapter ten we shall consider final causality in its relation to efficient causality in a
way that bears directly on the Five Ways.

Renard argues this way: "The expression of the universal law, that eoery agent acts for an end, is
called the principle of finality. It is a principle of knowledge, and is a self-evident truth. Indeed it
could not be denied without involving a contradiction. For if there were not final cause moving the
agent, the agent simply could not act, and hence it would a t once be an agent and a non-agent. Such a
being would be unintelligible, because it is made fuily intelligible precisely by the affirmation of the
end. We must conclude, therefore, that the principIe of finality is absolutely true, absolutely certain."
The Philosophy of Being,p. 146.
"George P. Klubertanz, "St. Thomas' Treatment of the axiom, 'Omne Agens Agit Propter Finem,"'
in An Etienne Gilson Tnbute, ed. Charles J. OINeiI, (Milwaukee: Marquette University Press, 1959),
pp. 116-117.
 CHAPTER VI1

A Glimpse of the Act of Existing

T o u see? said the Witch. When you try to think out clearly what this sun must be, you cannot tell me.
You can only tell me it is like the lamp. Your sun is a dream; and there is nothing in that dream that w a s
not copied from the lamp. The lamp is the real thing; the sun but a tale, a children's st~ry.~'

C. S . Lewis, The Silver Chair

At the end of chapter four we were given advice on how best to attempt
philosophizing about God, and how not to. Grabmann and Collins both point out
that we must not think that God's existence can be reached by a mere arrangement
of ideas and analysis of logical and mathematical concepts. The only way to reach
God's existence with our intellects, they stress, is by seeing and understanding the
best we can the act of existence in contingent beings encountered in our experience.
This is what we shali try to d o in this chapter.
But it will not be enough only to read this chapter. If we wish to read profitably
the Five Ways we must personally attain the intuition of what St. Thomas calls the
act of existing. Attaining i t requires an effort on our part that consists in more than
merely reading a few pieces of writing; we rnust try to see with Our minds the act of
existence which al1 actual things exercise. The only help 1can offer is to reproduce
written accounts of people's insights into this act of existing in hope that it will
point out the direction in which to look and the direction in which not to look. But
the actual seeing of this act must be done on our own by each of us, whether we are
metaphysicians or not. The accounts 1 offer below are not philosophical, but they
are reflections on the data accessible to any of us on which a metaphysician like St.
Thomas can go to work. Without it, 1 am afraid, we cannot hope to see why he
thinks the Five Ways demonstrate God's existence.

Being and Be-ing

In chapter three we distinguished between various meanings of being that enter
the philosophical activity of a rnetaphysician. We need to repeat them here so that
we may give a fuller account of some of the meanings. Being is, first of all, (A) the
present participle of the verb 'to bel. A helpful way to distinguish it from other
meanings would be to write it as be-ing. Being is also (B) a noun, as for exarnple
'painting' is a noun. This noun functions in at least three different contexts: (B') a
being (like 'a painting'); (B") a set of beings (like a collection of 'paintings'); and
(B"') the common nature of al1 beings (or 'paintings'). In metaphysics sense (A), or
be-ing means existence, or the actual exercise of the act of existing. But sense (B'")
is used to express being a s such, or that which is common to everything that in some
way exists. St. Thomas uses the Latin w o r d m to express this meaning of being, and
we may Say that ens designates that by which whatever is real, is real. For sense (A)
St. Thomas used the word esse ('to be' or 'be-ing'), and we rnay Say that esse is that
by which the real or ens is actual. For St. Thomas being (ens) is that whose act it is
to exist (esse). Thus ms expresses the subject of existence, and esse expresses the act
of the subject whereby the subject exists. Textual support for this may be found in
two of St. Thomas' early works: "The existence of a thing is called a being, not
because it has some existence other than itself, but because b y that existence the
thing is said to be.'lnl In SCG, II, 54,s St. Thomas says that "be-ing is the proper act
of the whole substance (ipsurn esse est proprius actus substantiae totius)" ... and "the
substance is calied a being (substantia dmominatur ens)." We can say, then, that be-
ing, or existence (esse) is the proper act of a being, or the subject of existence (ens).
This, then, is what we shall try to grasp in the present chapter: a being is said to be
insofar as it exercises the act of existing. How can we see this act, and on what
grounds can we affirm that it is a distinct act from a being's essence?
Before we take on the main task of this chapter an explanation of some key terms
is in order, particularly an explanation of being (ens) and be-ing (esse).*These two
terrns, it must be noted, are not terms for two different things but for two different
features. Al1 philosophizing, we noted in chapter five, is about being, or about that
which in some way is. The terms being and be-ing are two features of an existent.
Note first of al1 that an existent is that which exists, that is, anything whatsoever we
corne into contact with and which comes into contact with us. Note secondly that
an existent, or a that which is has two features: (a) the feature we may call that which
or ens; (b) the feature we may call eristing or esse. Our two key metaphysical terms
being (ens) and be-ing (esse) designate these two features of an existent or a that
which is-the object of al1 philosophizing.
Two points must be noted about these two features. The first is simple: neither
of these features can be except as related to the other. In other words, there is no be-
ing (esse or existing) feature of a being unless that feature be the feature of being
(ms or that which); there is no existing except the exting of a that which. Similarly,

there is no being (ens or that mhich) feature of a being except as related to a be-ing
(existz'ng)feature.

De Ver. (Truth), tram. by R.W. Schmidt, (Chicago: Henry Regnery Company, 1954). q. 21. a. 5,
ad 8. vol. III. Henceforth De Ver.
1 am relying for rny explanation on Leo Sweeney's Authentic Metaphysics in an Age of Unreality,
(New York, 1993),ch. V, and Gerard Smith's n e Philoso2hy of Being (New York, 1961), ch. XX.
 The second point qualifies the first point. Even though it is always true that
there can be no be-ing (esse) without being ( m s ) , it seems that it is not always true
that there can be no being without be-ing. It is not true with respect t o future
existents. A future existent is certainly a that which, but it has not the esse feature. It
seerns, then, that we must allow existents without existing, that is, we must allow
that t o be is to be a that which since it is possible to be without having t h e esse
feature. But St. Thomas will not allow for the possibility of an existent without the
feature of esse.

From the very fact that being [esse] is ascribed to a quiddity [that zerhich], not only is the
quiddity said to be but also to be created: since before it had being [esse] it was nothing, except
perhaps in the intellect of the creator, where it is not a creature but a creating e ~ s e n c e . ~
"God at the same time gives being (esse) and produces that which receives being
(esse), so that it does not follow that his action requires something already in
e~istence."~"
The only way to posit existents that d o not exist is by allowing that a future
existent is possible apalt from the cause which can make it to exist. But if we follow
St. Thomas, we cannot allow this because for him the very possibility of a future, or
a possible existent resides in the be-ing, not in its own be-ing, as in the case of an
actual existent, but in the be-ing of its cause which can make it to exist. T h e be-ing
of a future, or a possible, existent lies in the actual be-ing of its cause? The only
way, then, in which we can sensibly speak about a future existent within a
Thomistic context is in terms of an actually existing cause which has the ability to
make the future existent to exist, and without which the future existent is nothing.

m De Pot., q. III, a. 5, ad 2.
274
De Pot., q. III, a. 1,ad 17.See aiso ST,1, q. 44, a. 1,ad 1.
ns As we shall see in connection with St. Thomas' First Way, "something is not able t o be reduced
from potency to act [for e.uample, to go from a possible existent to an actual existent] except through
something which is in act." ST,1, q. 2, a 3, the First Way.
 In light of this we can sum up our description of an existent (a that which is). An
existent is that which is or can be; the can be of a future existent is the actual esse of
the cause which is able to make the future existent t o be. Any existent, whether
actual or possible, has two features: the bnng (ens) feature, and the be-ing (esse)
feature; the be-ing feature belongs to that existent which is present, or actual, or it
belongs to the cause of the existent if the existent in question is a future, or a
possible existent.
In the philosophy of St. Thomas two different words are used to describe the
being feature of an existent ( a that mhich is): substance and essence. The reason why
there are two rather than only one is that a metaphysician thinks and speaks of a
that mhich in two different ways: 1) as any that which whatsoever, for example a cat,
a man, a fish; 2) as a that which of a particular kind, for example, feline, or human.
The designated word for the first way of speaking of a that which is substance, and
the word for the second way is essence, but both refer to the that which of an
existent.
St. Thomas defines substance this way: "that which has a quiddity t o which it
belongs to be not in a n ~ t h e r . Substance,
"~~ therefore, is the subject of esse; it is that
to which it belongs, that to which it is proper or fitting, to be. An exampie will make
this clearer. It does not belong, or is not proper, to a wink to be as it belongs to the
one winking that he exist. A wink exists only as a qualification of the one winking,
whereas a winking man, for example, exists in his own right.
Essence, on the other hand, designates the name of the basic kind that a
substance is. For example, essence is the name of the hurnan kind of substance. Now,
in addition to substance-kinds there are also accident-kinds. Thus, for example,
short is a kind of h u n a n . Here, however, essence is an accidental, nonbasic,

n 6 ~ ~ 10.
I,25, ~ See
, also Aristotle's definition of substance, n. 104, p. 49 above.
qualification of substantial essence that a substance is. There can be no short
without that 7eihich is short. Further qualifications of a basic essence are accidents, or
accidental essences. We can Say, then, that essence is the name of "that by which an
existent is what it islWrn
either basically or accidentally.
Smith suggests that we can gain a deeper insight into the meaning of a substance
if we rename it a subsistent because "subsistent" is derived from sub-sistere, meaning
"to corne to a stop at."

And you must indeed "corne to a stop at" a proper subject of "existing," because there isn't any
proper subject of existing except it be one subject. Men are not made up of little men, nor houses
of little houses. A subsistent,then, is a substance viewed as one thing which exists. I t is too bad
that this basic meaning of substance skidded past Hume's mind. Substance, then, is that which
(an actual or possible being) an esse achieves or can achieve, but the esse doesn't achieve as
accidents do, namely, as qualiSing substance. Esse achieves so as by, in making substance t o
exist, making substance to be substance. (If its own esse does not achieve a substance, then we
are confronted with a possible substance, which is not possible apart from the esse of a cause, able
to cause it.)"
The be-ing (esse) feature of an existent, it seems, is its al1 important feature. It is the
one feature without which al1 the other features, including essence, can have no
daim to being real? I t is on account of be-ing that any existent is a being because
existence actuates everything. St. Thomas is unmistakably clear on this.
Existence [ipsum esse] is the most perfect of al1 things, for it is compared to al1 things as that by
which they are made actual; for nothing has actuality except so far as it exists. Hence existence is
that which actuates ail things, even their forms."

277
Sweeney, Authenitic Metaphsyics, p. 94.
mSmith, The Philosophy of Being, p. 376.
279 Even though existence actualises essence, essence lirnits and determines existence. Sweeney
rnakes this point in a very helpful way. "The act of existing is like the compressed spnng, the essence
it actualises is like the box [in which the spring is "tocated"]. Essence confines and Iirnits existence to
whatever size it is at any stage in its development. As an essence gradudly "grows," as it is perfected
by accidental changes, it allows existence gradually to expand t o where it wouid previously have
been if the essence itself had then been that perfect. Existence gradually actualises what i t wouid
have actualised earlier had the essence then been what it is now. Of course, if existence is in no way
confined by an essence distinct from itself, it is unlimited, and thus is infinitely perfect. God is such
an existent. H e is existence; H e is a spring uncontained in any box whatsoever; He is pure actuality
because He is subsistent existence." Authentic Metaphysics, p. 97, n. 49.
Z B O 1,~ q.~ 4, a. 1, ad 3. See also SCG, I,54; De Ver., q. XXI, a 5; In N Metaph., lect. 2, n. 558.
To sum up, then, be-ing (esse) is an act in virtue of which being (ens), conceived
either as substance or essence, exists and is actual (real).
One more point of clarification remains. In chapter five we saw St. Thomas
describing metaphysics, or the divine science, as the science of uniuersal or common
being (ens commune), or being as b&g(ens in quantum etis). Scholastic philosophers
like St. Thomas refer to being as being as that which has the following feature: a
thing that has nothing added to it. This feature can be o n e of two kinds:
Either its essence precludes any addition; thus for example, i t is of the essence of an irrational
animal to be without reason. Or we may understand a thing to have nothing added to it.
inasmuch as its essence does not require that anything should be added to it; thus the genus
animai is without reason, because i t is not of the essence of animal in generai to have reason; but
neither is it to lack reason. And so the divine being has nothing added to it in the first sense,
whereas universal being has nothing added to it in the second sense. "'
God is the divine being that has nothing added t o i t because his essence is such
that it precludes any addition, that is, his essence is be-ing. Common being is
created being, and it is variously described as being in general, or being, or the act of
existing, or being as being. Now, created being, in any of its descriptions, unlike the
divine being, possesses two features: 1) the feature of being a subject of the act of
existing; 2) the feature of the net of existing of a subject. The first feature has the job
of ensuring that the act of existing be an act of a subject because there can be no be-
ingof a subject without that subject. The second feature has the job of ensuring that
the subject exist because there can be no subject of t h e act of existing without be-
ing. These two features and the performance of their jobs are simultaneous and
inseparable.
Consequently, cornrnon being (ens commune), as well as being (ens), means any
subject of be-ing (esse), and the common act of ensting (esse commune), as well as
be-ing (esse), means any act of cxisting of any subject of be-ing. The phrase being as
being is thus a double emphasis which stresses the subject of metaphysics-that

See ST, 1, q. 3, a 4. ad 1.
which exists. It is a sensible phrase because being (ens) is that which exists, and it
c m rnean both a that which,when we are referring to a thing, and esse, when we are
referring to the "exists" of a that az~hich."
With this we have suffciently clarified and distinguished the rneanings of being
and be-ing to be able to understand a discussion that involves these concepts. W e
can now turn to the main task of this chapter: the attainment of the intuition and
knowledge of the act of existing.

The Intuition of the Act of Existing

Perhaps the first step toward catching a glirnpse of the act of existing by which a
thing is said to be is to try to see a distinction, a distinction between the fact that a
particular material thing actually exists and the fact that it is this thing. In other
words, we want to see in an actual material being not only what it is, but also that it
actually exists, and that these two facts are genuinely different. To get our own
intuition of the act of existing we can follow the example of a woman whose account
of it is picturesque and therefore easier to follow.

1 rernernber walking that day under the elevated tracks in a slum area, feeling the thought, "1 am
an illegitimate child. " 1 recall the sweat pouring forth in my anguish in trying to accept that fact.
Then 1 understood what it must feel like to accept, "1 am a Negro in the midst of privileged
whites," or "1am blind in the midst of people who see." Later on that night 1 woke up and it came
to me this way, "1 accept the fact that 1 am an illegitimate child." But "1 am not a child anymore."
So i t is, "1 am illegitimate." That is not so either: "1 was born illegitimate." Then what is left?

?gLCf. Jacques Maritain, Existence and the Existent (New York: Pantheon Books, Inc., L948), p. 24:
"This concept of existence, of to-exist (esse) is not and cannot be cut off from the absolutely primary
concept of being (ens, that-which is, that-which exists, that whose act i t is to exist). This is so
because the affirmation of existence, or the judgment, which provides the content of such a concept ,
is itself the 'composition' of a subject with existence, i.e. the affirmation that something exists
(actually or possibly, simply or with such-and-such a predicate). It is the concept of being (that-
which exists or is able to exist) which, in the order of ideative perception, corresponds adequately to
this affirmation in the order of judgment. The concept of existence cannot be visualised completely
apart, detached, isolated, separated from that of being; and it is in that concept of being and with that
concept of being that it is first conceived."
 What is left is this, "I Am." This act of contact and acceptance with "1 am,"once gotten hold of,
gave me t h e experience "Since 1 am. I have the right to be.""
Let us pause here to consider a contrast with this last sentence. Beginning with
Parmenides, and under a stronger influence of Plato, many philosophers have
thought the matter to be precisely the opposite, namely, "Since I am this kind of
thing, human, 1 have the right to be. It is primarily my humanity that gives me a
share in being." Descartes does a similar thing when he says that he exists because
he is a certain kind of thing, a thinking thing. We may cal1 this position technically
the prhmcy of essence, essentialism, or identiSing being wit h essence.
A tendency t o identib being with essence is very strong. Consider the following
statement made by a journalist paraphrasing the musings of some contemporary
scientists.
One of the weird aspects of quantum mechanics is that something can simultaneously exist and
noc exist; if a particle is capable of moving along several different paths, o r existing in several
different states, the uncertainty principle of quantum mechanics allows it to travel al1 along
paths and exist in a11 possible states simultaneously. However, if the particle happens to be
rneasured by some means, its path or state is no longer uncertain. The simple act of measurement
forces it into just one path or ta ce.^

The author of this statement is confusing different states in which a thing may exist
with the existence of that thing. He seems to think that because a particle may be
able t o exist traveling along different paths simultaneously, that for that reason it is
able both to exist and not exist a t the same time. This mns contrary to the first of
the ten principles of being and knowledge: it is impossiblefor a thing both to be and
not to be at the same tirne. The importance of this pincipie is underscored by St.
Thomas when he says that no one can make an intelligible judgment unless this
firmest principle is understood." But the moment we slip into the tendency to

See Rollo May e t al. (eds.), Existence: A N m Dimenrion in Psychiatq and Psychology (New York:
Basic Books, Inc., 1958 [Reprint. New York :Touchstone Books, 1967]),p. 43.
MalcoIm B r o m e , "The Quantum Conundmrn" (The New York Times, August 2,1997).
aoITZIV Metaph., lect. 6, n. 605.
identiS being with anything other than the act of existing, we run the risk of
making claims that contradict the first principle.
But regardless of how strongly we may feel the inclination to identib being with
essence, we must resist it if we are to make sense of St. Thomas' Five Ways. We
must try to see that being this or that kind of thing is not the same as existing. The
woman in our example above reached her experience of existence by cutting away
from it al1 of the characteristics not essential to it, or al1 of the different modes or
states of being. She describes her experience this way.

It is a primary feeling-it feels like receiving the deed to my house. It is the experience of my own
aliveness, not caring whether it turns out to be an ion or just a wave. It is like, when a very young
child, I once reached the core of a peach and cracked the pit, not knowing what 1would find and
then feeling the wonder of finding the inner seed, good to eat in its bitter sweetness ... It is like a
sailboat in the harbour being given an anchor so that, being made out of earthly things, it can by
means of its anchor get in touch again with the earth, the ground from which it grew... It is my
saying to Descartes, " I A m , therefore 1 think, 1 feel, I do." It is like an axiom in geometry-never
experiencing it would be like going through a geometry course not knowing the first axiom.... It
is ceasing to feel like a theory toward one's self...=

Our next account of grappling with the act of existing is less insightful, but 1 am
reproducing it here because it is an account, not of the insight into the act of
existing, but of the felt force the act has on the mind and heart of a thinker. He is
J.J.C. Smart whom we have met in chapter one. It is interesting that from a
professional philosopher we get an account less valuable than from an "amateur"
whose sense of wonder is alive. Smart's account points out an impediment that may
stand in the way of Our seeing the force of a demonstration of God's existence like
the Five Ways.

As an argument it [the Third Way viewed as cosrnological] cannot pass muster a t dl; indeed it is
completeIy absurd, as implying the notion of a logically necessary being. Nevertheless it does
appeal to sornething deep seated in Our natures. I t takes its stand on the fact that existence of
you or me or of this table is not logically necessary. Logic tells us that this fact is not a fact at d l ,
but is a truism, like the 'fact' that a circle is not a square. [Tell that to the wornan whose account
we read above.] Again, the cosmological argument tries to base the existence of you and me or
this table on the existence of a logically necessary being, and hence comrnits a rank absurdity,
the notion of a logically necessary being being self-contradictory. So the only rationai thing to

286 Rollo May, op. cit., ibid.

 say if someone asks 'Why does this table exist?' is that a carpenter made it. We c m go back and
back in such a series, but we must not entertain the absurd idea of going back to something
logically necessary. However, now let us ask, 'Why should anything exist at ail?' Logic tells us
that the only answer which is not absurd is to Say, 'Why shouldn't it?' Nevertheless, though 1
know how any answer on the lines of cosmological argument can be pulled to pieces by a correct
Iogic, 1 still feel 1 want to go on asking the question. Indeed, though logic has taught me to look
at such a question with the gravest suspicion, my mind oken seems to reel under the immense
significance it seems to have for me. That anything should exist at al1 does seem to me a rnatter
for the deepest awe. But whether other peopIe feel this sort of awe, and whether they or 1ought
to is another question. 1 think we ought to. If so, the question arises: If 'Why should anything
exist at all?' cannot be interpreted after the manner of the cosmologicai argument, that is, as an
absurd request for the nonsensical postulation of a logicaily necessary being, what sort of
question is it? What sort of question is this question 'Why should anything exist a t dl?' Al1 1cm
say is, that 1do not yet k n o ~ . ~

One cannot but feel compassion for a thinker like Smart, a thinker who embraces
an epistemology that sets his mind against itself and its natural tendency toward
grasping be-ing. Smart cannot deny the immense significance t h e question of
existence has for him, yet his epistemology is such that it will not allow his intellect
to look for the answer, calling it an absurd search. Perhaps this happens to al1
philosophical children of Descartes and Kant who admit the validity of first
principles as necessary laws of thought, but then give them only a purely logical
status and deny that the same principles are necessary laws of contingent being-as
if a philosophy of being could not also be a philosophy of mind.
If we are free of the tyranny of such an epistemology, the following account
whose author calls it prephilosophic will help us shed light on the act of existing. It is
an account of the natural intuition of the act of existing which is also a natural
awareness of the existence of God, that is, an awareness that proceeds by the
"instinctive rnanner proper to the first apperceptions of the intellect prior to every
philosophical or scientifically rationalised e l a b ~ r a t i o n . " ~

Let us rouse ourselves, let us stop living in dreams or in the magic of images and formulas, of
words, of signs and practical symbols. Once a man has been awakened to the reality of existence
and of his own existence, when he has reaIIy perceived that formidable, sometimes elating,

287 ~rnart,
op. cit.,p. 277-278.
~ a q u e Maritain,
s Appmaches to God, trans. by Peter O'Reilly, (New York: Harper & Brothers
Publishers, 1954). p. 3.
 sometimes sickening o r maddening fact I ex&, he is henceforth possessed by the intuition of
being and the implications it bears with it.
Precisely speaking, this primordial intuition is both the intuition of my existence and of the
existence of things,but first and foremost of the existence of things. When it takes place, 1
suddenly realise that a given entity-man, mountain or tree-exists and exercises this sovereign
activity to be in its own way, in an independence of me which is total, totally self-assertive and
totally implacable. And a t the sarne time 1 realise that 1 also exist, but as thrown back into my
Loneliness and frailty by this other existence by which things assert themselves and in which 1
have positively no part, to which 1 am exactly as naught. And no doubt, in face of my existence
others have the same feeling of being frai1 and threatened. As for me, confronted with others, it is
my own existence that 1 feei to be fragile and menaced, exposed to destruction and death. Thus
the primordial intuition of being is the intuition of the solidity and inexorability of existence;
and, second, of the death and nothingness to which nzy existence is liable. And third, in the same
flash of intuition, which is but my becoming aware of the intelligible value of being, 1redise that
this solid and inexorable existence, perceived in anything whatsoever, implies-1 do not yet
know in what form, perhaps in things themselves, perhaps separately from them-some absolute,
irrefragable existence, completely fiee from nothingness and death. These three Ieaps-by which
the intellect moves first to actual existence as asserting itself independently of me; and then from
this sheer objective existence to my own threatened existence; and finally from my existence
spoiled with nothingness to absolute existence-are achieved within the same unique intuition,
which philosophers would explain as the intuitive perception of the essentially analogical
content of the first concept, the concept of Being.
Next-this is the second stage-a prompt, spontaneous reasoning, as natural as this intuition
(and as a matter of fact more or less involved in it), immediately springs forth as the necessary
fruit of such a primordial apperception, and as enforced by and under its light. I t is reasoning
without words, which cannot be expressed in articulate fashion without sacrificing its vital
concentration and the rapidity with which it takes place. 1 see first that my being is liable to
death; and second, that it is dependent on the totdity of nature, on the universal whole of which
I am a part. 1 see that Being-with-nothingnes, such as my own being, implies, in order that it
should be, Being-without-nothingness-that absolute existence which 1 confusedly perceived
frorn the beginning as involved in my primordial intuition of existence. But then the universal
whole of which 1 am a part is itself Being-with-nothingness, by the very fact that 1 am part of it.
And from this it follows finally that since this universal whole does not exist by virtue of itself, it
must that Being-without-nothingness exists apart from it. There is another Whole-a separate
one-another Being transcendent and self-sufficient and unknown [not unknowable] in itself and
activating al1 beings, which is Being-without-nothingness, that is, seIf-subsisting Being, Being
existing through itself.
Thus the eternal dynamism of the intuition of existence, or of the intelligible value of Being,
causes me to see that absolute existence or Being-without-nothingness transcends the totality of
nature. And there 1am, confionted with the existence of ~ o d . "
Here we have the first glimpse of the object which the metaphysician, though
not yet as a rnetaphysician, encounters before he sets out t o demonstrate
philosophicaliy the existence and attributes of his subject matter, which is what al1
men cal1 God. I t is an object that one encounters by first becoming aware of the
existence of every being. Given that philosophical knowledge is a knowledge
through causes, a demonstration of God's existence will be a demonstration of the
existence of a cause of the existence of contingent beings. But such a demonstration
requires seeing why we must seek the cause of existence before we seek the cause of
anything else, why the contingency of existence is primary, that is, cornes prior to
the contingency of anything else. In the last section of this chapter we shall move
From a mere intuition of existence to philosophical knowledge of the act of existing.
In coming to know it we shall see the need for its cause, and so prepare our minds
for a demonstration of its cause.

The Role of Judgment in Apprehending Existence

The first two operations of the intellect are simple apprehenn'on and judgment.
Simple apprehension is an act of the intellect whereby it "seizes upon the essence of a
~udgmentis "an act of the mind combining
thing; grasps an object or rneaningn2%
two objective concepts in an affirmation or separating them in a negation; an act of
the mind asserting or denying existence of some subject.""'
As we saw above,= essences belong to an order different from the -order of
existence. Given that it is the role of simple apprehension to grasp essential concepts
and, therefore, to operate in the order of essences, existence must be attained by
judgment-that act of the intellect which either combines or separates objective
concepts. Maritain explains what it means that existence lies outside the order of
essential concepts and, therefore, outside the order of simple apprehension.

Existence is not an intelligible nor an object of thought [in the way that an essence is]. What are
we to conclude if not that existence goes beyond the object strictly so called, because i t is an act
exercised by a subject, whose eminent intelligibility, we may Say super-intelligibility, objectises

m ~ i c t i o n a yofScholastic Philosophy, p. 8. The third act of the intellect is remning.

"'i b i d p. 65. Owens warns against identifying this sense of judgment with a moral, deliberative,
investigative process that "leads up to a conclusion in which something is judged to be or not to be, t o
be or not to be so, to be or not to be done." Elernentanj Christian Metaphysics, p. 47, n. 8.
"See pp. 138-139.
 itself in us in the very act of judgment? In this sense we could cal1 it a trans-objective act. It is in
a higher and analogical sense that it is an intelligible. The intelligibility with which judgment
deals is more mysterious than that which notions or ideas convey to us; it is not expressed in a
concept but in the very act of affirming or denying. It is the super-intelligibility, if 1may put it
so, of the act of existing itself. either possible or actually given. And it is on this super-
intelligibility of existence that St. Thomas hangs the whole life of the intellect.=
The attainrnent of existence of some thing through judgment, therefore, does not
occur through an intellectual process like reasoning, but is the immediate
apprehension of the existence of an existent?% This does not rnean that the
existence of a thing is not attained by the intellect in a complex way. On the
contrary, even though judgment is an apprehemion of being, i t is "the complexity of
. " ~ composition is understood in various ways by Thomist
an active c ~ r n ~ o s i n gThis
scholars. Maritain understands i t as having three stages.
The first stage is that of 'judgment' (missnamed) of our external senses,
pronouncing a sort of 'blind' assertion: 'this exists."
In the second stage an idea and ajudgment are formed out of the intelligibility
(still only in potency) available from the 'judgment' of the first stage in the realm of
sense. The idea is 'this being,' and the judgment is 'this being exists.' The judgment
occurs as a composition of the object of thought and the act (not notion) of existing.
Maritain explains the formation of this judgment in the following way:

In forming this judgment the intellect, on the one hand, knows the subject as singular (indirectly
and by 'reflection upon phantasms'), and, on the other hand, affirms that this singular subject
exercises the act of e'risting. In other words, the intellect itself exercises upon the notion of this
subject an act (an act of affirming) by which it [ives intentionally the existence of the thing. This
affirmation has the sarne content as the 'judgment' of the aestimative and the external sense (but
in this case the content is no longer 'blind' but openIy revealed since it is raised to the state of
intelligibility in act); and it is not by reflection upon phantasms that the intellect proffers the
affirmation, but by and in this 'judgment' itself, and in this intuition of sense which it grasps by

Maritain, Existence and the Existent. pp. 18-19.

I t is clear, therefore, that if al1 our philosophizing consists exclusively in the third act of the
intellect, or reasoning, we shall not able to understand what a philosopher like St. Thomas is doing
when demonstrating the existence of Cod. If the act of existing is not grasped through reasoning, and
Our philosophizing is exclusively the activity of a logician, we are in no position to enter a meaningful
didogue with a philosopher for whom the act of existing plays the pivotal role.
2F6 Owens, Elmentary Chriman Metaphysics. p. 56.
 irnmaterialising it, in order to eaupressitself. I t thus reaches the actus essendi (in judging)-as it
reaches essence (in conceking)-by the mediation of snzroria~~erception.~

The third stage is the formation of the idea of existence. After the intellect,
together with first judgment of existence, has formed the idea of being ('that which
does or is able to exist'), it grasps the act of existing which it already affirmed in the
fint judgment of existence. When this act is grasped, the intellect has made for itself
an object of thought, a concept of existence.
Owens elaborates on this conceptualization of the act of exisitng by comparing it
to the conceptualization of "whiteness." Even though in reality "existence", like
"whiteness" does not exist in itself but in a subject, the intellect is able t o
conceptualise what it apprehends through judgment and apply it to any existent.
Thus "as whiteness applies to any instance of a white body, so does being, when thus
conceptualised, apply to anything whatever that exists. In conceptualizing anything
the mind knows it under a universal aspect."lm
The difference, however, between the conceptualization of "white" and of
"being" is that the former is attained through simple apprehension of a body that is
in fact white, and the latter in the act of composing which becornes lost when being
is conceptualised. That is, the content of simple apprehension is retained when the
notion of "white" is conceptualised. but the concept of "being" once attained does
not contain in it the subject of being. Nevertheless, Owens says, the concept of
"being" represents the characteristic that makes a thing to be. I t does this just the
way whiteness makes a body white, that is, as a "subject and characteristic possessed
by the subject. Thing is conceived as a subject, and being is conceived vaguely as
that which makes such a subject be, just as whiteness makes a body white."%

296 Maritain, Erktmce and the Existent, p. 27. n. 13.

2m Owens, Elemmtcq Christian Metaphysics, p. 58.
248 Ibid.
 Owens explains how this metaphysical conceptualizing of that which makes a
subject to be (existence), the conceptualizing of the relation of subject and
characteristic, has roots in Anstotelian natural philosophy. In Aristotle's physics the
fundamental subject of change in nature is matter, and this subject is characterised
by form. The intellect attains and retains form by simple apprehension, that is, the
act of judgrnent does not enter into the apprehension of form, and in this the
apprehension of f o m and existence differ. Nevertheless, Owens points out, Aristotle
understood form also as the act (energeia) and the perfection (entelecheiu) of the
subject. This means that the subject is a potency in regard to the uct of the subject,
and the perfection confers upon the subject that which it lacks. Consequently, act
and perfection characterise the subject. The subject/character relation between the
subject and its act and perfection lends itself to an extension beyond the order of
matter and forrn, that is, beyond the sphere of physics or cosmology into the order of
being, that is, the order of rnetaphysics. Owens explains.
They may be used to designate the function of the being that is apprehended through judgment.
Without its being, the thing would not exist, would be nothing. Being, therefore, ma be regarded
as a perfection that makes the thing exist and as an act that the thing is able to enjoy.
22
The concept which the intellect has of being is therefore that of an act or perfection
of a subject. This allows the metaphysician to universalise being in the unalloyed
concept of act or perfection. It is within this concept that the metaphysician speaks
scientifically (in the scholastic sense of the word) of being, both as ens and esse, that
is, as "the actuality of al1 acts, and therefore the perfection of al1 perfections."j1
In the next section we shall attempt to make a more detailed stepwise
attainment of the act of being, the act of that which is.

Zg) lbid.p- 59. (emphasis mine)

e q. V1I.a. 2, ad9.
m ~ Pot.,
The Knowledge of the Act of Emsting
At this point I can only assume that an intuition of the act of existing has been
grasped and proceed t o the realm of knowledge of that which has supposedly been
intuited. If it has not been grasped, the rest of this work will seem very puzzling and
unconvincing.
The content of this section is a brief epistemological account of t h e act of
existing. Our goal is t o see how as philosophers we can reach the act of existing.
Reaching it requires going through several steps which are fully treated in some
contemporaiy works on Thomistic rnetaphysics.3D'W e shall treat them only briefly
here, but with enough indication of their essential characteristics required for
reac hing the act of exist ing.
For St. Thomas, the first object of the intellect is being (ens) and its tmth as it -
resides in a matenal thing. Given the place of residence of this object, our intellect
encounters first that whose existence is rneasured by duration. In becoming aware of
such an object it is inevitably conditioned by it; it is conditioned by the object's
mixture of actuality and potentiality, which is to say that our intellect's knowledge
of its first object is at first indistinct or unspecified, and only gradually becomes
actualised. The Theologian explains the situation this way:

In our knowledge there are two things to be considered. First, that intellectual knowledge in
some degree arises from sensibIe knowledge: and, because sense has singular and individual
things for its object, it follows that our knowledge of the former cornes before our knowIedge of
the latter. Secondly, we must consider that our intellect proceeds from astate of potentiality to a .
state of actuality; and every power thus proceeding from potentiality to actuality comes first to
an incompIete act, which is the medium between potentiality and actuality, before accomplishing
the perfect act.=The perfect act of the intellect is cornpiete knowledge, when the object is
distinctly and determinately known; whereas the incomplete act is irnperfect knowledge when

"' See Avery Dulles, et al., Introductonj Metaphpics (New York, 1955). Robert Kreyche Frst
Philosophy (New York, 1959). Gerard Smith The Philosophy of Being (New York, l96l), Joseph
Owens, An Elementary Christian Metaphysics, (Milwaukee, 1963), and Leo Sweeney, Authentic
Metaphysics in a n Age of Unreality, (New York, 1993).
"Let us keep this incornplete act in mind when we consider the first of the Five Ways, for. as we
shall see, in this act lies the key to seeing properly the data of the First Way.
 the object is h o w n indistinctly, and as it were confusedly. A thing thus imperfectIy known is
known partiy in act and partly in potentiality ... as to know animal indistinctly is to know it as
animal; whereas to know animal distinctly is to know it as rational or in-ational animal, that is to
know a man or a lion: therefore our intellect knows animal before it knows man;and the same
reason holds in comparing any more universal idea with the less universal.-

Now we know that the most univeeal of al1 concepts is being (em), however it
be known at first. The act of existing (esse) which is inextricably tied up with ens,
will be, according to Our mode of knowledge, at first known only indistinctly. We
must now see what steps the intellect must make before it can see a material thing's
act of existing distinctly. Our question is this: How does the human intellect corne
to know being as being-a thingthat is as eristing ( a quod est as esse, or ens qua
esse)? The rest of the chapter is a long answer to this question.
To answer, we must go through several stages. Let us start at the beginning of
the intellect's encounter with being as becoming or with a material being. Because
this is an encounter of the human intellect, the intellect must first receive a group of
sense images or phantasms o n which it then goes t o work. These contain forms of
sensible things which, because they are sensory, are quantified, localised, and
moving. Thus the intellect receives from sense powers material things as
quantitatively unified, that is, as three dimensional, in this or that place, at such and
such time, and as either mobile or immobile. As such, the objects in their

33
ST,1, q. 85, a. 3.
"Maritain sums up the irnmediate and undifferentiated attainment of esse in the following way: "At
the instant when the finger points to that which the eye sees, a t the instxnt when sense perceives, in
its blind fashion, without intellection or mental word, that thk exists; a t that instant the intellect says
. (in a judgment), this being is or exists and at the same time (in a concept), being. We have here a
mutual involution of causes, a reciprocd priority of this concept and this judgment, each preceding
the other in a different order. T o Say, 'this being is or exists,' the idea of being must be present. To
have the idea of being, the act of existing must have been affirmed and grasped in a judgment.
Generally speaking, simple apprehension precedes judgment in the later stages of the process of
thinking; but here, a t the first awakening of thought, each depends upon the other. The idea of being
(' this being') precedes the judgment of existence in the order of material or subjective causality; and
the judgmect of existence precedes the idea of being in the order of formal causality." Existence and
the m e n t , pp. 25-26.
quantitative unity and becoming corne to the intellect undifferentiated, but the
intellect is still able to abstract from this undifferentiated unity the first universal:
For if many singulars are taken which are without differences as to some one item existing in
them, that one item according t o which they are not different, once it is received in the mind, is
the firs universal, no matter what it may be, i.e., whether it pertains to the essence of the
singulars or net.%

This first undifferentiated aspect "according to which they [singulars] are not
different" is their magnitude (size) as a whole. But magnitude is never by itself
because i t depends on nearness or distance which immediately implies movement:
Movement and rest are sensed according as the subject is affected in one or more ways in the
magnitude of the subject or of its locd distance, as in the movement of growth or of locomotion,
or again, according as it is affected in some sensible qualities, as in the rnovement of alteration.%

Therefore, that according to which singulars are unified is their magnitude and their
actual state of becoming (movernent), which conditions their magnitude. The
expression used by St. Thomas for this unifying aspect is hic et nunc, here and now,
which refers to the measures of the movable and the movement, place and time. Now
when the intellect puts aside the singularity of the singulars and considers only this
unibing aspect (which is rnovement), it acquires an intelligible content which is
something in process of becorning, a what is (quod est), or being, and that is its first
universal.
I t seems, then, that we identify a material object as moving with its act of
existing (to be is to be moving)? This identification enables the human intellect to
affirm that the first universal is the apprehension of being or of what is, because it is
an apprehension of an actually moving material thing. And this seems fitting since
the proper object of the intellect is being as becoming which the intellect grasps by

=st. Thomas Aquinas, Commentary on the Posten'orAnalytics Of ANtotle, t r a m by F.R Larcher,

(Albany, NY:Magi Books, Inc., 1970). Book II, k t . 20. p. 239.
=ST, I,q.78.a3,ad 2.
is true, however, that we know of this identification only after we have reached the act of
existing. We are now speaking with the advantage of a retrospective view point.
grasping that which characterises it, namely its movement. Thus movement serves
t o us as a substitute for the act of existing because it reveals t o us the act of existing.
The intellect, of course, does not see that this is so a t this stage.

For since words are signs of intellectual conceptions, we first give names to those things which
we first understand, even though they may be subsequent in the order of nature. Now of al1 acts
which are perceived by us in a sensible way, motion is the best known and most evident to us;
and therefore the word actuality was first referred to motion, and from motion the word was
extended to other things. And for this reason motion is not attributed to non-existent things ...
For, since to be moved means to be actual, it follows that things which do-not exist actually
would exist actually; but this is obviously falsem

We may restate the matter in another way in order t o see more clearly that we
d o in fact identify a rnaterial object's act of existing with its movement which is to
our intellect the best known and the most evident act upon tke first encounter with
contingent being. Given that being is the first universal and that it is what is
(something in the process of becoming), an expression consisting in a pronoun and a
verb, and, given that the verb must signih active and passive action, both of which
constitute the essence of m o ~ e m e n ti,t ~is fitting that being as becorning be known

=in IX Metaph, lect. 3, nn. 1805-1806. Chicago, 1961. p. 667.

U9 St. Thomas explains this in a way that makes clear the necessary connection between movernent
and causality, and our knowledge of them. This is very important for our understanding of his
argument in the Five Ways. "For the intelligibility [ratio] of motion is completed not only by that
which pertains to motion in the nature of things, but also by that which reason [ratio] apprehends.
For in the nature of things motion is nothing other than an imperfect act which is a certain
incipience of perfect act in that which is moved. Thus in that which is being whitened, something of
whiteness already has begun to be. But in order for the imperfect act to have the nature [ratio] of
motion, it is further required that we understand it is a mean between two extremes. The preceding
condition is compared to it as potency to act, and thus motion is called an act. The consequent
condition is compared to it as perfect to irnperfect or as act to potency. And because of this motion it
is called the act of that which exists in potency.
With reference to that which pertains to motion in the nature of things, motion is placed by
reduction in that genus which terminates the motion, as the imperfect is reduced to the perfect. But
with reference to that which reason [ratio] apprehends regarding motion, namely, that it is a mean
between two termini, the intelligibility [ratio] of cause and effect is already implied. [Again, this is
important for a consideration of the first of the Five Ways.] For a thing is not reduced from act to
potency except by sorne agent cause. And in respect to this motion belongs to the predicament of
action and passion. For these two predicarnents are taken in respect to the inte1Iigibility [ratio] of
agent cause and effect, as was said above. (Insofar as a thing is denominated by the agent cause, there
is the predicament of passion. For to be acted upon is nothing other than to receive something from
an agent. And conversely, insofar as the agent cause is denominated by the effect, there is the
by a concept that a t the same time encompasses being as w h a t in process of
becoming, or as a what is, that is, that a material thing's act of existing be a becoming
or movement. For "is said simply, signifies to be in act,'"" and for being as becoming
that means being in movement, which, for the human intellect, is the first actuality
of al1 subsequent acts.
So, when the intellect first knows being, it knows it as an actually existing
corporeal thing, and it knows every sensible singular by this first and most universal
(in the realm of being as becoming) of al1 concepts. However, this first and the most
universal of concepts is also the poorest of concepts, poorest in the sense that it fails
to provide the intellect with a distinct knowledge of any singular, of any specific
nature or essence, and of being as being-being insofar as it is-(for the knuwledge of
is in what is is still indeterminate, still enrneshed in local movernent, growth, or
change inhering and arising from a corporeal whole). The concept gives the intellect
only evidence that physical being is in its actuality in the state of becoming, that for
it to be is to be becoming.
But this poor universal concept is the starting point for the intellect's quest for
the knowledge of essential content of its concepts. It is a quest for the quiddity of
everything it knows, the quest for the content of the what in what is, or being (whhat
is) as a which (quid), as having this or that nature-as a res or thing. And this
determination of the what element of being is the second stage in the intellect's
quest for the real and knowable.
Now because the human intellect can know something distinctly only if it uses
its body, because its proper object is being as becoming which is also material

predicament of action. For action is an act fiom the agent to another.)" Commentay on AristotZe's
Physics, ed. cit., Book III, lect. 5, n. 324 (322). p. 152 (150).
On Intelpretation: Cornrnentary by St. Thomas and Cajetan, tram. by J.T.Oesterle,
310 Anstotle
(Milwaukee: Marquette University Press, 1962.) Book 1, lect. 5, n. 22. p. 53.
(bodily) being, it will discover res or quid of quod quid est in t h e sarne place it
discovered what is,namely in an organised group of images or phantasms.
The proper object of the human intellect, which is united to a body, is a quiddity or nature
existing in corporeal matter ... Now it belongs t o such a nature to exist in an individuai, and this
cannot be apart from corporeal matter: for instance, it beIongs to the nature of a stone to be in an
individual stone, and to the nature of a horse t o be in an individual horse, and so forth.
Wherefore the nature of a stone or any material thing cannot be known completely and truly,
except inasmuch as it is known as existing in the individual ... And, therefore, for the intellect to
understand actually its proper object, it must of necessity turn to the phantasms in order to
perceive the universal nature existing in the individual?'

When the intellect turns to the phantasrns of sensible being, it examines al1 its
characteristic aspects and eliminates some which seem to it less typical in preference
to those which seem more typical. The intellect thus arrives at a t h k mhat in place of
the vague what; i t arrives at a particular sensible with its distinctive elements called
a thing. To know a being as a thing is to recognise that al1 the characteristics which
surround that being are dependent on it (entitatively dependent on it, as an arm is
entitatively dependent on the whole man), and that beyond them is their owner-
being as thing or quiddity.
S u t analyzing the what of being, and finding its res, the intellect has not done
away with its is, because it is still seeking that which is. Nor does it d o away with the
characteristics of what 13which helped it t o arrive at the quiddity. Properly placing
these characteristics according to their hierarchy and place constitutes the third
stage of the intellect's quest for the real in the order of being as becoming.
Instead of leaving being as onl a composite of quiddity and the act of existing
(which at this point it knows only as movement), the intellect takes everything the
world offers it regarding sensible being and places it either under the heading of
substance or accidents. This gives the intellect a whole new category in the attempt
to deepen its knowledge of being. The category is technically called intentiones, and

311
ST,1, q. 84, a. 7. As we shail see in chapter nine, this position puts St. Thomas in direct opposition
to any Platonic or essentialist understanding of being.
it allows the intellect no longer to have to consider the quiddity in its absoluteness,
but as a central locus for many modifications that perfect it without altering its
essence. This new category does not give the intellect the knowledge of new being
but new and different knowledge of the same being. The intellect now begins to
consider the relations between that which is and its characteristics, between
substance (a new name for that which is within the category of intentiones) and
accidents which are the effects of substance and which perfect substance. To use St.
Thomas' expression, the substance is the final and the efficient cause of its accidents,
and their material cause insofar as it receives the accidents.312
The knowledge of substance and accidents gives the intellect new and different
knowledge of already known being: the knowledge of the perfection of being which
does not corne to it through its quiddity but its accidents, because by means of its
accidents a materiai being is able to enter into a communicative union with the rest
of the world, to take there its place and fulfill its function, which is to Say to be
perfected.

Since being properly signifies that something actually is, and actuality properly correlates to
potentiality; a thing is, in consequence, said simply [absolutely] to have being, accordingly as it
is primarily distinguished from that which is only in potentiality; and this is preciseIy each
thing's substantial being. Hence by its substantial being, everything is said to have being simply
[absolutely]; but by any further actuality it is said to have being relatively. Thus to be white
implies relative being, for to be white does not take a thing out of simply potential being; because
only a thing that actudly has being can receive this mode of being.
But goodness signifies perfection which is desirable, and consequently of ultimate perfection.
Hence that which has ultimate perfection is said to be simply [absoIuteIy] good; but that which
has not the absolute perfection it ought to have (although, insofar as it is at al1 actual, i t has some
perfection), is not said to be good and perfect simply [absolutely], but only relatively. In this
way, therefore, viewed in its substantial being a thing is said to be simply [absolutely], and to be
good relatively (i.e., insofar as it has being), but viewed in its complete actuality, a thing is said
to be relatively, and t o be good simply [ a b s ~ l u t e l ~ ] ? ' ~

Accidents are, therefore, complements of quiddity: quantity gives being extension,

qualities give it powers to act and to be acted upon and thus enter into relations and

312
See ST, 1, q. 77, a. 6, ad 2.
313
ST, 1, q. 5, a. 1,ad 1.
contact with other beings, and to be the beginning and the end of movements. In a
word, accidents perfect substance whose effects they are. Thus when St. Thomas
says that "every agent acts according as it is in a~t,"~"%e
means that substance is in
act in so far as it has al1 its accidents because it attains actuality, and therefore
perfection, through them. Accidents are in substance, and also by and for substance,
they are the effect of the substantial being of substance, but are also the means by
which substantial being attains its perfe~tion.~'~
But in none of these three steps have we made any progress in apprehending the
is of what is. In other words, we have still not reached the center of the Thomistic
notion of being; we have not yet moved beyond Aristotle. But neither have we been
able to forget the is because every quiddity implies the act of existing? Now
because we are dealing with an act, a primary and simple aspect of being, we c a n o t
define it. We can only, by way of induction, circumscribe it from proportion
Apprehending the is of what is is the fourth
between the potential and the a~tual.~''
step in the intellect's quest for the real, and to reach this step we shall have to make
use of the first three.
When the intellect first encounters being, it sees is as an act which it
understands as motion. Thus it encounters existence in the motion of material
things. (This is precisely why St. Thomas begins his demonstration of God's
efitence with recipients of motion in the First Way and with finite movers in the
Second Way.) But in identifying is with motion, on the pretext that they both mean
to be in act (in actu esse), it is Iek with the poorest of concepts deprived of its
mysterious character (the act of existing). Furthermore, when the intellect

3 ' 9II,~ ~,
16,6.
315
See ST, 1, q. 77, a. 6.
e Thomas' Commentanj on the PostmorAnalytics of A>istot[e, Book 11, lect. 5-6.
3 1 6 ~ eSt.
St. Thomas' Commentaly on the Metaphpics ofAristotle, Book I X , lect. 5, n. 1826-1827.
3'7~ee
discovers the quiddity or the res of being, act no longer means the mobile, and the
intellect is forced to realise that its earlier ideotity of act of existing with motion,
although valuable at the level of indistinctly known being, must disappear and be
replaced by a concept of act as the stable and immobile element in being. Thus, for
example, form as the act of matter at the level of quiddity means that by which a
thing is what i t is- a concept of act that is not immediately related to movement,
but indicates that the indeterminate has been determined. The same is true of
accidents which are acts of substance; they are the that by which a thing already
constituted receives its actuality and perfection.
In light of the new meaning of act the intellect sees three possibilities for the
meaning of is. First, existing could mean becoming a substantial form. But this
would make the act of existing identical with becoming, and therefore mobile and
unstable which is contrary to the nature of acts because it belongs to potencies, and
it would also mean that only matter-form composites exist. A deeper problem with
identifying is with becoming a substantial form lies in the fact that substantial forrn
is an act that presupposes another act which has as its principle the act of existing.

... the nature of materid things ... [contains] a twofold composition. The first is that of form and
matter, whereby the nature is constituted. Such a composite nature is not its own existence [if it
were, to exist would be identically to be that composite nature, which is false because there are
other composite natures]; but existence is its act. Hence the nature itself is related to its own
existence as potentiality to a ~ t . ~ ' ~

Second, to exist could mean to be an accidental form, to be a that by which a

substantial form receives some new actuality (perfection). But this too would make
the act of existing mobile, and therefore unlike a true act. Also, is cannot mean an
accidental forrn existing through the substance: "Since being is not a genus, then
being cannot be of itself the essence of either substance or a~cident."~'~

318
ST, 1, q. 50, a. 2, ad 3.
3 " ~ TIII,
, q. 77, a. 1, ad 2.
 This leaves us with the meaning of is as the act of that which Ir that is entirely
different hom substance and accidents, and that has a special place among al1 acts.
Early into his magnum opus the Theologian tells us its meaning.

Existence is the most perfect of al1 things, for it is compared to al1 things as that by which they
are made actual; for nothing has actuality except insofar as it exists. Hence existence is that
which actuates al1 things, even their forms [It is precisely on this point that St. Thomas
departs from Aristotle, and in light of it the Theologian's dernonstration of God's existence
differs fiom the Philosopher's.j Therefore it is not compared to other things as the receiver is to
the received; but rather as the received to the receiver. When therefore 1 speak of the existence
of man, or horse, or anything else, exjstence is considered a formal principle, and as something
received; and not as that which existxJaD

We see from this that is signifies that which is shared by whatever is being, but that
it itself does not share in anything. The act of existing is neither form, nor essence,
nor substance, nor matter. It is that by which everything real is formally said to be
and without which it cannot be: "From the very fact that being is ascribed to a
quiddity, not only is the quiddity said to be but also to be created: since before it
had being it was nothing, except perhaps in the intellect of the creator, where it is
not a creature but the creating essence.""'
In reaching the is of being the intellect has reached that which is common to al1
being, that which unites each and every being into a distinctive totality called being
as being. It is the peak of the intellect's awareness of the actual and the knowable.
The last thing we need to do is show, more carefully (for we have already given a
rough outline), how the intellect forms the concept of being as being. Obviously, it is
not the first thing known by our intellect. If it were, the Presocratics would have
discovered it at the very outset of their philosophical adventures. When being first
becomes known, it is the most indeterminate and potential of al1 the concepts the
intellect constructs upon its encounter with what is (quod est) in the realm of

1, ~
3 " 0 ~ a. 1,ad 3. Thus the Five Ways are an inquiry into this reception of the act of existing on
q. ,4,
the part of a moving thing, an effciently causing thing, and so on. That is, the Five Ways Iook into
the cause or the giver of the act of existing by showing that it is required for a full explanation of
being as becoming considered in five different aspects.
" D e Pot.,g. III, a 5, ad 2.
becoming. But the indetermination of being is the indetermination of the quod and
not the est, because, at this level of the intellect's knowledge of the real, which is
movement, the first known act, determines the est as its visible substitute. At the
second stage-the definition of being as quiddity-this first determination of est
disappears because the notion of act now broadens from movement to the
substantial form whose function it is to be the act of matter. In the third stage the
intellect encounters an even broader notion of act when, in dividing being into
substance and accidents, it knows the accidents as the perfection of substance, that
is, as a new act added to form which is the first act.
But a strange thing has happened. Through the first three stages of the
intellect's quest for the real, it has achieved a greater determination of the quod, but
at the same time the meaning of est as act has become increasingly indeterrnined
(because the notion of act has so become). Thus at the end of the intellect's quest, is
or the act of existing seems most undifferentiated, but the what or thing has
achieved the highest degree of differentiation through a distinction of matter and
form, substance and accidents, and essence and existence. "Things are not
distinguished from one another in having being, for in this they agree [this shows
the universality of being or the act of existing]... Things differ because they have
diverse natures, to which being accrues in a diverse wayVm
But we said that in knowing the act of existing we have reached the peak of our
awareness of the real. It seems then that the end of Our knowledge of being as being,
which is the indetermination of est, is as indeterminate and undifferentiated (and
therefore irnperfect) as was t h e beginning of Our knowledge which is the
indetermination of quod. Are we then doomed to a very imperfect knowledge of the
act of existing, and are better off concentrating only on quiddities? Are many
modern phiiosophers right in dismissing al1 claims to the knowledge of is?
To help us answer we must point out St. Thomas's distinction between two
kinds of universality which wil1 help us distinguish the first knowledge of being
from the knowledge of being as being.

To know anything universally can be taken in two senses. In one way, on the part of the thing
known, nameiy, that only the universal nature of the thing is known. To know a thing thus is
sornething less perfect: for he wouId have but an imperfect knowledge of a man who only knew
him to be an animal. In another way, on the part of the medium of such knowledge. In this way it
is more perfect to know a thing in the universal; for the intellect, which by one universal medium
can know each of the things which are properly contained in it, is more perfect than one which
cannot.323
We see then that it is not because of the universality of the medium through
which the universal knowledge is acquired that such knowledge is so poor, but
through the confusion of its content. The universal knowledge of the intellect is
imperfect insofar as that which is known is indistinct. But even though this
knowledge is imperfect, it is knowledge nonetheless. Can we clear up the content of
this imperfect knowledge? Can we know est as distinct? For the final verdict let us
consider a text in De Ente et ~ s s e n t i aone
, ~ of St. Thomas' earliest works, where he
explains the notion of distinctness or indistinctness of a thing, and our knowledge of
it. By applying his definitions of confused and distinct knowledge to the concept of
being as being, known both concretely and abstractly, we shall answer our question.
In the second chapter of De Ente et Essentia the Theologian brings out the
difference between concrete and abstract knowledge of quiddity. The sarne
difference, as we shall see, applies to the knowledge of is. As his example, he chooses
the apprehension of the that which is of man.

32.3 ST,I,q.55,a.3,ad2.

We are dealing with chapter two of this work, and 1shall use Rgis' exposition of it whereby he
gives St. Thomas' accounts of concrete and abstract knowledge of quiddity.
 In the realm of concrete knowledge, man can be known under three aspects of his
human nature: as animal, as rational, and as this or that man (individual). When he
is known as animal, the knowledge of his form or act is indistinct (for there are other
anirnals that are not man). When he is known as rational, the knowledge of his form
or act or nature is distinct, but the knowledge of him as an individual is indistinct
(he is distinguished now from every other nature but indeterminate with respect to
individuals). Finaily, when he is known as this man, as Socrates, to use St. Thomas'
example, the knowledge of his nature and individuaiity is distinct. Now the fact that
a nature is individuated by quantified matter (as human nature is individuated by
this particular man) indicates an imperfection in that nature, namely, the inability
to stand on its own without having to go out of its realm to stand. Human nature is
always found in this or that individual subject in whom it inheres; it cannot stand
apart from this or that individual. This, according to Rgis, points to the presence of
both perfection and imperfection of our knowledge of quiddity (in this case man's
quiddity).

The quidditative knowledge of man is therefore perfect knowIedge of his nature's perfection,
while individual knowledge is the perfect apprehension of the imperfection of this same nature
that cannot exist in itself but must exist in a subject. Thus, the individual is a limitation of the
perfection of human nature, whereas rationality is a limitation of the imperfection of animal
nature.325

Thus to know man as rational is to know what is perfect in him, but to know him
as animal and as an individual is to know what is imperfect in hirn, because as animal
he is lacking act and as an individual his act is limited. And this is what it is to have
a concrete knowledge of man's quiddity.
Abstract knowledge of man's quiddity is the knowledge of his humanity. The
difference between m a n and humnnity is the difference between that which
determines and that which is determined (man is determined by his humanity-he is

"Rgis, op.cit., p. 303.

what he is because his essence or humanity determines hirn to be a hurnan kind of
thing); it is a difference between the distinct and the conhsed, the pure and the
mixed (the conhision and the mixture lie in his being both hurnan and animal).

The essence of man is signified by the two t e m 'man' and 'humanity,' but in different ways. The
term man expresses it as a whole, because it does not prescind from the designation of matter but
contains it implicitly and indistinctly, as the genus contains the difference. That is why the term
man can be predicated of individuals. But the term 'humanity' signifies the essence of man as a
part, because its meaning inchdes onIy what belongs to man as man prescinding from al1
designation of matter. As a result it cannot be predicated of individual man. Because of this the
term 'essence' is sometimes attributed to a thing and sornetimes denied of it: we can say 'Socrates
is an essence' and d s o 'the essence of Socrates is not Socrates.
a

Humanity is therefore the forma1 element of the subsisting individual. To know

humanity is to know the quiddity of man stripped of al1 that is not distinctly
himself. In this consists the abstract knowledge of human nature.
Rgis finds it helpful to apply the distinction between concrete and abstract
knowledge of quiddity to the concrete and abstract knowledge of being as being,
that is, to quod est as esse. To have a concrete knowledge of the act of existing is to
conceive of having b k g (habens esse) as concrete knowledge of man is knowledge
of hauing humanity (habens hurnanitatem). It is the knowledge of the subject that
shares in humanity but does not contain it in its totality. In concrete knowledge of
the act of existing the hauing is to esse (which is its form or act) as that which
determines the form or act in the same way that the individual human subject
determines the rationality (the human nature or form or act) in whom i t inheres.
Such determination or limitation always signifies imperfection. But abstract
knowledge of the act of existing, like abstract knowledge of quiddity, strives toward
a complete purification of its object, stripping away from it whatever does not
belong to it, stripping away everything that belongs to essence, until it reaches its
very identity, or absolute sirnplicity. Concrete knowledge involves determination of
its object by limitation, that is, leaving in the object the mixture of potentiality and

= ~ t Thomas
. Aquinas. On Being and Essence, ch. II. 13.
actuality. Abstract knowledge is a determination by distinction, a knowledge of the
real only through its actuality, a process of distinguishing the object's actuality from
al1 potency.
Such a process is long and cornplex; it is a quest for a being's pure actuality
which involves elimination of everything in the being that contracts, Iimits, and
differentiates, followed by the combining of this pure act with that whose act and
perfection i t is, namely, the essence. This intellectual process is known as philosophy
of being as be-ing or first philosophy or rnetaphysics Through this long and involved
process distinct knowledge of the act of existing becomes slowly clearerSmWehave
said enough, however, throughout the course of chapters six and seven t o give us a
general overview of that process, and to establish the philosophical legitimacy of
such a process. The four steps of the intellect's quest for the real constitute the main
phases of the rnetaphysical enterprise. The more familiar we become with that
enterprise the more comfortabie we shall be with the Five Ways of St. Thomas. The
main thing 1 wish t o show here is that the act of existing is no less knowable than
hurnanity, and both are knowable in the same way. Thus to deny the knowability of
the act of existing involves the denial of the knowability of humanity.
With the knowledge of the act of existing man has attained the most perfect
apprehension he can have, for the act of existing, unlike essence or quiddity, is that
by mhich beings are acts and perfect; it shows him being in an aspect that is not a
mixture of act and potency, but an absolute actuality.
-
It [the is of what is] primarily signifies that which is understood in the mode of actudity
absolutely; for "is" said simply, signifies to be in act, and therefore signifies in the mode of a verb.
However, the actuality which the verb "is" principally signifies is the actuality of every form

"See again the works rnentioned in n. 301, p. 151 above. See also Etienne Gilson Thomist Realism
and the Critique of Knowledge, (San Francisco: Ignatius Press, 1986), ch. eight "Apprehension of
Existence." This chapter is particularly important for a comparison between St. Thomas and Kant on
the question of knowing existence, and the entire work is important for a comparison of Thornistic
and Kantian epistemologies.
 commonly known, whether substantial o r accidental. Hence when we wish to signify that any
form or act is actually in sorne subject we si@& it through the verb

In knowing the act of existing we know being as being, we know that which is
insofar as it is. The act of existing is that which makes every single thing a
something,real (actual) and therefore knowable. Knowing that existing is the
common act of al1 real things enables the hurnan intellect to unite the multiplicity of
distinct beings, and to consider each thing (res) not as an isolated and separate
thing from everything else, but as a constitutive part of the unity of reality, a
distinctive totality to which has been given the concept beingas being- This concept
unites al1 sciences because their respective objects are al1 beings exercising the act of
existing. Without such a unibing concept, and without a science of being as being,
we would have a multiplicity of sciences that are in no real way connected, leaving
man's intellectual activity fragrnented, confused, and divided within itself.
Finally, having reached the primacy of the act of existing, we have reached that
which is the highest in the contingent being, which is to Say the highest in caused
being. Therefore, the contingency of being is most pronounced at the level of
existence, and for that reason the need for a cause is most evident there. But that
science which is concerned with the highest causes, the Theologian says, is the
science of being as being, and in it the intellect encounters God as the highest cause
of the most pronounced contingency-the cause of existence in a being that is not
identically its existence but shares in it.

g s ~ ~ oOn t kIntetpretation: Comrnentaq by St.Thomas and Cajetan, Book 1, lect. 5,n. 22.
Owens, however, calk for caution in our attainment of the concept of the act of existing. I t is true
that for St. Thomas universal or common being is that "by which everything formally is" (see On
Being and Essence, ch. V ) , and as such the subject of metaphysics. Nevertheless, Owens says,
"extreme caution has to be exercised not to regard common being in the fashion of other common
concepts. It represnts a perfection that was not originally attained through conceptuaiization, a
perfection that exhibits no special conceptual content. From the view point of original conceptual
content it is the equivalent of nothing, it is ernpty. To be used in metaphysics it has t o be kept
trained upon being that is judged. Used in this way it retains existential content, a content that is the
richest and most meaningful of dl." Elernentay Christian Metaphysics, p. 61.
 W e have not, however, succeeded in grasping what existence is. No one has
succeeded in doing that, and we would search in vain through St. Thomas' texts for
a definition of existence. W e have acquired knowledge of existence by
distinguishing it from essence, by showing that essence has an act by which it is,
because, as we shall see in chapters eight and nine, nothing in the essence accounts
for the being of that essence, and the identification of essence with existence lands
us in positions contrary t o facts. We affirm existence of individual existents by
making existential judgments that we are able t o make from our experience and
from reasoning (in St. Thomas' sense of the word) about the data received in
experience. We shall Say more about this in chapter nine.
The need to reach that cause is precisely the point a t which the intellectual
activity called natural theology begins, and it has al1 along been an activity of
philosophizing about beng as being. As St. Thomas puts it, "the act of existing is the
first effect, and this is evident by universal presence of this act. It follows that the
proper cause of the act of being is the first and universal agent, namely Gad."=
When this proper cause is reached through demonstration, the natural theologian
has reached the object of his science, but the science is not born at that point, it only
reaches a higher phase.
Before we turn directly t o the Proper Cause we need to have another attempt a t
understanding its effect, namely, the act of existing. In this chapter we have tried to
reach it primarily in an epistemological way. In the next chapter we shall do so
metaphysically. Another reason for making a different attempt at grasping more
clearly the act of existing is that the account of it which we gave in this chapter is
not accepted by al1 Thomist scholars.
 Joseph Bobik, for example, insists that "one cannot judge that a thing exists...
unless existence has already (by an analytical priority) been c o n ~ e i v e d . "He
~
argues the same point in the commentary on his translation of St. Thomas' De Ente
et Essentia.
The claim that existence is not an essence, and hence is not directly open to the intellect in
simple apprehension, is an arnbiguous claim. If it is taken to rnean that the fact of the existence of
a natural substance is not of the understood content of its essence,... then it is an acceptable
daim. Bur if it is taken to mean that the intellect cannot conceiue existence (or therefore
conceiue being) unless it has affirmed and grasped existence in a judgment, it is an unacceptable
claim. For it is obvious that existence cannot be affirmed in a judgment unless it has been
conceived, as i t is that anything else cannot. For to judge is simply to pronounce ita est [thus it
is] about a joining of concepts which are not conceived together, but which are nonetheless
conceived prior (at least analyticdly) to the joining and to the ita est. It is the function of the
intellect to conceive wit hin itself ai1 things ...
To conceive being is also to conceive existence and essence, but it is to conceive al1 three in an
undifferentiated and "unwordednway ...
The object of the first operation of the intellect [simple apprehension] is anything and
everything in things which is the source of any and every sort of actuaiity. I t is things as actual
which move the intellect to produce them within itself in a concept. Things as possessing the
actuality which is existence (this is always some sort of existence) rnove the intellect t o produce
them within itself in the concept of being: habentia esse, which, when later explicitly unfolded,
becomes habentia esse et essentiam. Things as possessing that actuality which is human existence
move the intellect to produce them within itself in the concept of man: habentia esse quae habent
etiam cotpus et animam rationalem. The object of the second operation of the intellect
budgment] is to pronounce ita est about any proposition a t d l , including propositions in which
the predicate concept is that of existence. The role of judgment is sirnply to join together that
which is found together, but which the hurnan inteIIect has not conceived together, whatever the
concepts i n ~ o l v e d . ~ ~ ~

Bobik's position, in a nutshell, amounts to giving the act of existence, both in reality
and in knowledge, a much Iess pronounced and elevated status in an individual
being than a scholar like Joseph Owens gives it.

For the rnetaphysician neither the nature predicated nor the subject of predication, as they are
attained through simple apprehension is the prior constituent. From the metaphysician's
viewpoint the being of things, whether it is real or intentional, is always prior to the things
th e r n s e ~ v e s . ~

"~ o s e Bobik,
~ h "Some Comments..." New Scholasticism, XXXIII (1959), 69.
J. Bobik, Aquinas On Being and Essence, (University of Notre Dame Press, 1965), pp. 209-212.
am ose^ h Owens, An EZernentary Christian Metaphysics, pp. 24 1-242.
 Now Bobik does not deny a real distinction between existence and essence, but
he does argue for a sense in which they can also be seen as "reallythe s ~ r n e "This
.~
results in an understanding of a relationship between existence and essence where
the two are less clearly distinguished than a scholar like Owens thinks they must be.
We shall not be able, 1 think, to understand the force of this debate, unless we
examine more closely the relationship between essence and existence. This is
another reason behind the content of the next chapter.

3U Bobik, Aquinas On Being and Essence, p. 170. Bobik also denies that the act of existing is an
intrinsic cause of a given being. See his "Some Disputable Points Apropos of St. Thomas and
Metaphysics," New Scholastih, 37 (October, 1963), pp. 428-430.This is difficult to square with
some of the texts we have already encountered where St. Thomas insists that existence is most
influential in producing an existent. See ST, 1, q. 3, a. 4; 1, q. 4, a. 1, ad 3.
 CHAPTER VU1

The Act of Existing and Some Other Acts

"Beingmust be compared to essence, if the latter k distinct fmm it, as actuality to potentiality."

St. Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologiae,1,3,4

Seeing the Problem

In chapter three we saw that for scholastics philosophizing begins with trying to
understand the changing world containing a multiplicity of finite things." This is
true both in cosmology and metaphysics because the principles of potentiality and
actuality, which are indispensable for understanding the world of experience, are
operative both in being as mobile and being as such. Our discussion of essence and
existence will best develop in the context of act and potency.=

33nI am relying in this chapter on the following works in metaphysics: Henri Renard, The Philosophy
of Being,(Milwaukee, 1952), sections 1 and II; Avery Dulles et al., Introductoy Metaphysics, (New
York, 1955), part II; Gerard Smith, The PhiZosophy of Being, (New York, 1961), chs. 1-IV (this is the
work 1 shall rely on most); and Leo Sweeney, Authentic Metaphysics in a n Age of Unreality, (New
York, 1993), part II.
In n. 265 (p. 131 above) we gave a working definition of act. For the present purpose the
following understanding of potency will suffice. "Active potency, which as a principle of action, is a
capacity for doing. Generaily, however, when we speak of potency we refer to passive rather than
active potency; and passive potency is a principle which is acted upon-a determinable principle
capable of receiving new forms. Active potency, on the contrary, is really act. Pasivepotency is called
pure potency when i t does not contain any act o r perfection. Hence, prime matter, which is
denominated solely in relation to the particulas form to which it is ordered, is called pure potency.
 Recali from chapter three (second section) the discussion of the fact that there
are beings which change, and the fact that there are beings which are generated
from other beings. A philosopher wants to know how it is possible that these facts be
as they are. Aristotle, refusing the positions of Heraclitus and Parmenides, asserts
that these facts are only possible if there be something common to the beginniiig
and end of change and generation. To deny this is to deny both change and
generation. In other words, change and generation are made possible by this
common "something" which we shall cal1 passive potency. Let us try to understand
i t first in change and then in generation.
Take as an example a tomato which changes from green to red. A philosopher
wants to know how it is that the tomato cari remain itself even though it differs as it
changes from green to red. Aristotle and St. Thomas refuse to accept that green and
red and the motion between green and red are necessarily given along with the
tomato. They do not deny that the change is given. But in saying that it is given
they do not want t o Say that it is given because green, red, and the motion between
are one and the same as being a tomato. To be a tomato is not identically to be
changing and to be the termini of change (green and red). The point that must not
escape us is this: Tornato does not change into a tomato, but is a tomato at the start
of change. What we are presently philosophizing about is not the generation of a
tomato, but its change; we are looking at its becoming accidentally other than the
kind that it is-becoming red after having been green. The reason why this is
phiZosophically interesting is that the tomato as a tornato does not have to become
red. As philosophers we want to know how it is possible that it so becomes given
that its becoming and the termini of that becoming are not necessary features of

Passiue potencg is [also referred to as naturalpotency, by which] is meant that capacity which, being
rooted in the very nature of a composite being, receives acts proportionate t o t h a t nature." Henri
Renard, The Philosophy of Being, pp. 29-30.
being a tornato. If they were, then red, green, and the motion between, would be
identically tomato. Now the reason why our tomato cannot be identically the
motion between red and green, or any other motion, is that there are in fact other
things of different kinds, an apple for example, that are also moving from red to
green, and other things undergoing different kinds of motion. Motion, and its
various termini, therefore, are not tomato. How is it possible, then, that Our tornato
be in motion when it clearly is not identically motion? How can the same thing, the
tornato, be both same and different-be a tomato and be in motion?
Aristotle's and St. Thomas' answer is that motion resided in the tomato as an
actuation of what a tomato as a tomato is able to be; it resided in i t both during al1
the actual intervals of the motion and at the terrnini of the motion, (before and after
the motion) because a tomato is able to have motion reside in it as an actuation of
what a tomato c m be. Thus, insofar as the tomato is in potency, as the one that is
able to move, it is the same as the one that does move. But when the tomato, as one
able to move, does actually move, we can Say that the same being (that which is a
tomato) is different (that which is in motion). Insofar as the tomato is in act, the
being which does move can be said to be different from the being which is able to
move. But when the being which is able to move does actually move, we can Say
that the different being (in motion) is the same (tomato).
In the case of generation we philosophise along the same lines. W e encounter in
the world beings of different kinds, and we want to know how it is possible that
there be different kinds of being. Let us take again as example our tomato and add a
stone Iying next to it in the garden. Both are beings, but one is organic and the other
inorganic. Therefore, one kind is not another kind. But they also have something in
common, not only as beings, but also as kinds. The tomato, which is organic,
eventually turns into inorganic stuff. In fact al1 bodily beings eventually become
inorganic. Therefore, there must be something common to al1 kinds of bodily being.
The important point to note here is that this common something cannot itself be a
kind of bodily being because it is common to ail kinds of bodily being. We have,
then, in every bodily being a composite of the common something which is of no
kind and that which makes it a particular kind-we have again a composite of
potency and act. Now it is, according to Aristotle and St. Thomas, precisely the fact
that al1 bodily beings are composites of this type which allows for the possibility of
there being different kinds of being. This composite of potency and act helps us see
how one kind of being is both same and different from a composite of another kind.
The tomato shares a common feature with the stone because the potency (Aristotle
calls it prime matter) which is in the tomato and the stone is able to be both organic
and inorganic. Thus when the prime matter of one or the other is actuated into the
tomato kind or the stone kind, then the tomato is different from the stone, and vice-
versa, because what is said to be differing is that which is able to differ. We are then
speaking from the order of potency. On the other hand, the tomato differs from the
stone because different acts are actuating their prime matter. Thus when prime
matter is actually there, then that which is able to differ in kind (that which is the
same in both) is differing in kind. We are then speaking from the order of actes
To speak, then, philosophically about beings that change and are generated is to
speak about beings that are composites of potency and act. This is central to a11
Aristotelian and Thomistic philosophizing.

=NO one denies that the insight here is difficult to grasp. Aristotle is the first to admit this: "Motion
is thought to be indefinite because of the fact that it cannot be placed in an unqualified way either
under the potentiality or the actuality of things; for neither that which is potentially a quantity nor
that which is actually a quantity is necessarily moved. And although motion is thought t o be an
actuality of a sort, yet it is incomplete; and the cause of this is the fact that the potentiai, of which
this is the actuality, is incomplete. And it is indeed because of this that it is difficult to grasp its
whatness; for it must be placed either under privation or under potentiality or under unqualified
actuality, but none of these alternatives appears possible. What remains, then, is the manner in which
we described it, namely, that a motion is a sort of an actuality-an actuality such as we have stated,
dificult to grasp but capable of existing." Physics, III, 2,201b 28 - 202a 1.
The Composite of Essence and Existence
In metaphysics, in that philosophical activity where we encounter the Proper
Cause, we speak of beings not only insofar as they are changing and generated, but
also as existents. Here we ask this question: How is it possible that many different
existents (not diffrent generated beings; not different according to their kinds) have
the same status of being an existent? Unless we see why the question, the question
of the possibility of this fact, has any force, we shall not suffciently appreciate the
answer. Keep in mind that in metaphysics, no less than in the science of bnng as
mobile, we philosophise about composites of potency and act. But here on a higher
level.
It is easy not to see the force of the question, that is, it is easy not to question the
possibility of many different existents having the same status of an existent. The
unity side of the equation is fairly straight foreward-if there is one existent, there
must be one existent. But we ought to be careful not to assume that it is also true
that there m u t be many existents. There is nothing necessary about the multiplicity
of existents. To Say that there is, amounts to a claim that if one existent is given,
then al1 existents must be given. What is wrong with such a claim? In short, it is
contrary to our experience of the status of an existent which is the status of a
contingent existent (an existent that is but need not be).
Let us briefly examine Our experience of an existent to see what it reveals. I shall
argue that i t reveals something in addition to its features as a changing being and as
a being of a kind. This additional revelation is such that i t need not be given in the
example of our one existent, and for the same reason it need not be given in any
number of existents. In other words, we have good reason to inquire into the ground
of the possibility of there being many existents.
Smith suggests we run the following test case: "a man is having his teeth pulled."
We can understand the meaning of that statement without knowing or being in the
situation in which teeth are being pulled. The meaning may not be clear unless we
know a similar situation, but it is nevertheless possible to understand the meaning
of any intelligible statement without knowing whether the situation which the
statement expresses is also a situation that exists. This means that there are two
situations to be known: 1) knowing what is going on (a man is having his teeth
pulled), and 2) knowing that what is going on is going on. It is tme that both
situations are situations of the same existent, but they are two situations, and they
are known as two.
We are not saying that the second situation adds something t o the intelligibility
of "a man is having his teeth pulled." W e are, however, saying that anyone who has
ever been in such a situation knows more than the intelligible contours of that
situation (which can also be known by anyone who has not been in it). What is that
more? To answer is to Say something about the difference between essence and
existence. To try to answer is t o reach for the very center of Thomistic metaphysics.
W e can restate the question to make it clearer. Let us cal1 the first situation an
essential status and the second an existential status. W e pointed out that there is no
essential difference between there actually existing the situation "a man is having
his teeth pulled" and it not existing. Nevertheless, there is an existential difference
between it existing and not existing. What is that existential difference? The best
way of stating the difference is to follow St. Thomas when he says that "being
(ipsurn esse) must be compared to essence, if the latter is distinct from it, as actuality
to p ~ t e n t i a l i t ~Thus
. " ~ we can Say that the existential status is an actuation of the
essential one: an existing status of "a man is having his teeth pulled" is a composite
of essence (of what that status is) and existence (of that status existing) which makes
the essence actual.
 Before we explain how this twofold character of every existent is the ground for
Our claim that the multiplicity of existents is not necessary, we must Say much more
about the twofold character, about the composite of essence and existence.
Let us go back to our tomato. To Say that our existent tomato is a composite of
essence and existence is to Say that a tomato in an essential status (the status of
Lycopersicon esculenturn) is also in an existential one; one status is different from
another even though the existent which is in both of them is one existent. We must
be carehl here not to view the essentid status as essential, that is, we rnust see that
we are not talking about the essence tomato, but about an actually existing tomato.
To speak of essence as a component of a composite of essence and existence is to
speak of an essential status of this or that existent, of this tomato; we are not
speaking about the tomato status of tomato but about the tomato status of this here
tomato. Why is this important? It is important for seeing why it cannot be the case
that if one existent is given, a11 existents must be given; it is important for seeing
contingency as a philosopher of being as being sees it.=
Consider the matter further. It is possible that an essential status remain both
the same (as it does in this and that tomato) and that it be different (as it does in
tomato, feline, human). But whether it is the same or different, it always pertains to
distinct existents. This means that a n essence is a factor in a distinct existent
because it is an essential status of a distinct existent, and not because it is an
essential status of an essence. To know a composite of essence and existence is to
know first some actual existent; actual existent is the immediate data of a
metaphysical inquiry where a proper distinction is made between essence and

=And this, of course. is of greatest importance for seeing the need a contingent being has of a cause,
of its dependence on a cause. This dependence lies at the very heart of the matter we are dealing with
in the Five Ways. The understanding of that dependence divides interpreters of the Five Ways into
those who see the act of existing and its cause as central to St. Thomas' arguments, and those who do
not.
existence. Gerard Smith points out a great difficulty that befalls an inquiry with a
different immediate data,

A composite of essence and esse which wou1d not be an existent to start with, would not allow
for many existents, because the sarne essence doesn't distinguish between many existents, and
different essences would distinguish many existents only in their kind.uO
The only way, then, that we c m make sense of the multiplicity of existents is to see
the existential status of an essence. We must see beings as composites of existence
and essence, which is to Say as actual existents in some essential status. The
alternative is either to deny reality to the multiplicity of existents, or to take the
possibility of the multiplicity for granted. These alternatives, however, are not
Thomistic. and St. Thomas' philosophizing (specially in the Five Ways) cannot be
understood if we take these alternatives.
As we have already seen in chapter seven, the word which St. Thomas uses to
describe the existential status of an actual existent, regardless of its essential status,
is substance. He defines substance as "a thing whose quiddity is competent to have
e Say, then, that, Thomistically understood, a
being not in a s u b j e ~ t . " ~ Wcan
substance names a subject of which we can Say it is, for example, a tomato exists.
Note that the same name substance, as a subject of to bel does not apply in the case of
a tornato's pedicle ensts, or a toomato's colour existx In this case we are not speaking
of the proper subject of to bel but of its part or a qualification. Pedicle and colour are
not competent to have being not in a subject, therefore, they are not, properly
speaking existents. Consequently, a proper existent does not consist in a bunch of
subexistents, and it is not any of its parts or qualifications, nor is it al1 of its parts
and qualifications "put together".
- - -

mThis, 1shdl argue below, is no l e s ~true in the Five Ways. There the imrnediate data must also be
actual existents if we are to reach God as the proper cause of the act of being-
30 ~ e r a r Smith,
d The Philosophg of Being, pp. 64-65.
De Pot., q. VII, a. 3, ad 4. In SCG, 1, 26 St. Thomas defines substance as "a thing to which it
belongs to be not in a subject."
 Now even though an existent, as the proper subject of to bel is in sorne essential
status, substance is not a name for that essential status. St. Thomas calls the
essential status as such essence.

According t o the Philosopher substance is twofold- In one sense it means the quiddity of a thing,
signified by its definition, and thus we Say that the definition means the substance of a thing; in
which sense substance is cailed by the Greeks ousia, which we may cal1 essence. In another sense
342
substance means a subject or supposihcrn, which subsists in the genus of substance.

Substance, on the other hand, is the name of an actual existent in some essential
status understood as the subject of to bel and therefore essence is not the proper
name of the subject of t o be. We find support for this in the following text:

... some predicates may be said to add to being inasmuch as they express a mode of being not
expressed by the term beirzg. This happens in two ways. First, the mode expressed is a certain
special manner of being; for there are different grades of being according to which we speak when
we speak of different levels of existence, and according to these grades different things are
classified. Consequently, substance does not add to a difference to being by signifyng some
reality added to it, but substance sirnply expresses a special manner of existing, narnely, as a being
in itself. The same is true of the other class of existents.... We can, however, find nothing that can
be predicated of every being affirmatively and, at the sanie time, absolutely, with the exception
of essence by which the being is said to be. To express this, the term thing is used; for according
to Avicenna, thing differs from bein because being gets its name from to be, but thing expresses
the quiddity or essence of the being.%

This distinction between being and thing is later echoed in ST, 1, 44, 2, where it is
expressed within the context of causality, which is of direct importance for
understanding the Five Ways. "Therefore, whatever is the cause of things considered
as beings, must be the cause of things, not only according as they are such by
accidental forms, nor according as they are these by substantial forrns, but also
according to al1 that belongs to their being at al1 in any way." Thus the cause of
being is also the cause of the existence of individuation and substance. In light of
this w e can see clearly why, for example, parents are not directly the cause of the
existence of their offspring, as 1have argued against Geach in chapter two.

342
ST, 1, q. 29, a. 2.
"~e Vm.,q. 1, a. 1.
 The reason, then, why we are able t o see in an actual existent a composite of
essence and existence is that an actual existent, which is to Say substance or a proper
subject of to be, cornes to us in experience always as being in some essential status,
whether or not we know that status. But the reason, given the composite of both
essence and existence, why we do not cal1 its essence the proper subject of to be, but
rather the individual existent, is that in Our experience any essential status is the
status of an actual existent.
But if essence is not the proper subject of to be, how are we to understand it
within the composite of essence and existence? We must see it as a component," or
as a factor in many subjects of to be each of which is always in a n essential status.
The difficult point to see here is expressed very well by Smith.

Yet it is because existents or substances o r the proper subjects of "isn are themselves
compounded (of the subject of "is" and its "is) that we can speak of composite of essence and esse.
The distinction of "is" from each subject of "is" is as between the subject and its own "is" in each
subject and thgt subject itself. If you will, the distinction is between a subject in esse and that
subjectls esse.%
The mistake we are too easily prone to is thinking that the composite of essence and
existence is the composite of man (homo sapiens) and to be (ipsum esse). It is rather,
using Sweeney's example, the composite of Paul, who is the proper subject of to be in
an essential status (in this case human) and to be. The reason is that there is
nowhere in our experience homo sapiens, but always only Paul and Mary from whom
al1 our philosophizing about essence and existence comes. It is in them that we find
an essential status. It is true that both essence and substance name the same existent
(Paul and Mary), but they do so uey differently. It is a difference we already saw

3M Leo Sweeney offers a helphl way of seeing essence and existence as components. In directly
perceiving an actual material existent, he says, we perceive that it "(a) not only is zethat it is (Paul is
this man), but (b) aIso actually exists (Paul is). But evidence #a is other than evidence #b. But
diverse evidences indicate the actual presence within of diverse cornponents. Therefore, such
evidences indicate that an existent is actually made up of two real and distinct cornponents."
Authentic Metaphysics, p. 93.
w~rnith,The Philosophy of Being., p. 67.
St. Thomas making, namely between thing and being Whenever we speak of a
tomato, or of a being which is a tomato, tornato (the essence) designates the essential
status of some actual existent; tomato is what makes this here existent a thing. But
substance refers to that same existent insofar as it is a proper subject of to be
regardless of its essential status, regardless even of the fact that it may be one of
many different existents in the same essential status.
We have now placed ourselves in the proper position from which to understand
St. Thomas' distinction between essence and existencelX6which is a distinction
between a proper subject of to be, existing here and now, in some essential status,
and its to be. It is in the context of that composite that we must see why the
possibility of the multiplicity of existents considered metaphysically must not be
taken for granted. Recall our earlier question: How is it possible that many different
existents have the same status of being an existent? Restate the same question now
in light of the understanding of the composite of essence and existence we just
worked out: How is the following situation possible? Clearly all composites of the
proper subject of to be (substance) and their to be are necessarily the same insofar as
they are such composites, but each one differs from every other precisely a t the
point where al1 composites are the same, namely, in their existential status. They are
al1 composites, they are al1 existents, yet what distinguishes one from another, what
allows for the possibility of there being many existents, is not that they are such
composites (which they al1 are), but that they are existents (which they also al1 are).
In order to understand this puzzling situation Thomistically we must not fail to
notice first a very important point which may be gathered from several texts. In St.
Thomas' first Surnrna we find a text that helps us see the point, and also contributes

346 St.Thomas, of course, is not the first to make the distinction between essence and existence.
Many other medieval Christian and Isiarnic philosophers have made it. What we wish to see is why
the act of existing is the highest act of every creature, and why it is precisely in reference to it that a
creature's.dependence on a proper cause is most clearly expressed.
 181

toward Our attempt to understand the context of the arguments for God's existence
in that work.

Since every agent acts so far as i t is in act, it belongs to the first agent, which is most perfect, t o
be most perfectly in act. Now, a thing is the more perfectly in act the more its act is posterior in
the way of generation, for act is posterior in time to potentiality in one and the same thing that
passes from potentiality t o act. Further, act itself is more perfectly in act than that which has act,
since the latter is in act because of the former. These things being posited, then, it is clear from
what has been shown in Book 1 of this work that God alone is the first agentmWTherefore, it
belongs to Him alone to be in act in the most perfect way, that is, to be Himself the most perfect
w act ir benig, wherein generation and al1 rnovement teminate, since a-/ f o n and
act.= ~ o this
act is in potentiality before it acquires this act. Therefore, i t belongs to God alone t o be His own
being, just as it pertains t o Hirn only to be the first agentem
The point we must see here is that the act of being precedes al1 other acts. Before
out tomato becomes red, it must first exist; and before it turns into fertiliser for next
year's crop of tomatoes, it must exist, and before the fertiliser turns into a new
tomato, it too must first exist. Because "the act of being is wherein generation and
al1 rnovement terminate,"m change and generation are already given by the time we
begin philosophizing about them; they are given in the preceding existential status
of an existent in whom we find change and generation?'

3"Reference here is to SCG 1, 13 where St. Thomas gives various arguments for God's existence.
Now where, we may well wonder, has it been shown in those arguments that God is the first agent?
Have not those arguments simply been arguments for and Unmoved Mover and an Uncaused Cause?
Yes, they have been, insofar as the arguments are understood in an exclusiveIy Aristotelian way. But
St. Thomas wants to say more, that is, he wants to say more about the dependence of the data on a
cause than Aristotle says about it. St. Thomas' God is the God of Exodus 3:14, the "HE W H O IS", to
whom he refers at the end of the text we are quoting. This is not Aristotle's Unmoved Mover,
although Anstotle's Unmoved Mover may be seen to be that with a bit more philosophizing about
the effects, or creatures, of this God. What more? We must see thern as receivers of an act which they
posses because they have been given it, and because it is an act above al1 of their other acts.
% ~ h i sis what makes St. Thomas' F i n t Agent more than Aristotle's Unmoved Mover, namely, His
way of being in act is most perfect because He is, and does not receive, that act. This act is the act of
being or the act of existence, and Aristotle ctearly does not speak this way of his God anywhere,
319
SCG, II, 52,7. (italics mine) See also De Pot., q. III, a. 5; ST, 1, q. 44, a. 2; and 1, q. 45, a. 1,ad 2.
350 AS al1 cosmological chinking terminates in rnetaphysical thinking, rather than being a
cornpartment of it (see Diuision and Methodr; of the Sciences, VI, 1).
Smith points out that for this reason we can say that "it is not because things change or are
generated [are begotten by their parents] that they exist; rather it is because they exist t h a t they
change and are generated." The Philosophy of Being, p. 69. W e are now in a better position to
understand why a thing can be dependent on a cause both for its becorning and being. W e can now
 As preceding al1 other acts (accident, substantial form, etc.), the act of existing
has the job of adding the feature of existing to an essential situation of some actual
existent. But note what follows from this: because the act of existing adds the
feature of existing, it is the very reason why the existential status of an actual
existent is the status of an actually existing essential status. Given that an essential
status cornes to be by the act of existing, the act of existing makes that essential
status of some actual existent to be essential. Our tomato cornes to exist by its act of
existence, that is, the act of existence adds existing t o the essential status of our
actual tomato, but also by its act of existence our actual tomato is a being which is a
tomato.The latter is a strong claim, but consider the following text.

God alooe is altogether imrnutable: whereas, every creature is in some way mutable.* Be i t
known therefore that a mutable thing can be called so in two ways; by a power in itself; and by a
power possessed by another. F o r al1 creatures before they existed, were possible, not by any
created power, since no creature is eternal, but by the divine power alone, inasmuch as God
could produce them into existence. Thus as the production of a thing into existence depends on
the will of Cod, so likewise it depends on His will that things should be preserved; for he does not
preseme them othenwise than by evwgiving them existence; hence if He took away His action from
thern. oll things would be reduced to n o t h i ~ z ~Therefore
?~ as it was in the Creator's power to
produce them before they existed in themselves; so likewise i t is in the Creator's power when
they exist in themselves t o bring them to nothing. In'this way therefore, by the power of
another-namely, of God-they are mutable, inasmuch as they are producable from nothing by
3!3
Him, and are by Him reducible from existence to non-existence ....

see better why Geach's insistence that one's parents can give one existence runs contrary t o St.
Thomas' view.
* Here we have a clue how St. Thomas differs from Aristotle in his deepest understanding of the
Unchanged Changer, the Unmoved Mover, or the Immutable Muter, if you will. This is not a
disagreement with Aristotle, but going beyond.
= ~ r e a t u r e sare not preserved by having been given acts other than existence (neither by substance
nor accidents), and when that a c t is taken away the other acts disappear. Thus essence disappears
into nothing if i t is not being actuated by the act of existence. St. Thomas is making a very strong
claim here about esse, and sharply distinguishing it from essence. This sheds Iight on the cause effect
relationship between the God of the Five Ways and his creatures, because God's action of which St.
Thomas speaks here is causal action, which is primarily that of giving existence-the act of giving
that which the giver has himself not received from another (and this ultimately makes him the First
Unmoved).
This, then, is how St. Thomas' Unmoved Mover, to whom he always refers to as First Unmoved
Mover. o r simply as First ove;, is t o be understood. God is unmoved or irnmutable because he
alone is not brought into existence nor preserved in it by the power of another nor by his own
power- simply, HE IS, which, as Moses tells us, is His narne.
 Thus in every creature there is potentiality to change either as regards substantial being, as in
the case of things corruptible; or as regards Iocality only, as in the case of celestid bodies; or as
regards the order to their end, and the application to their powers to diverse objects, as is the
case with the angels; and tiniversally al1 creantres genwally are mutable by the pozeier of the
Creator, in Whose power is their &ence and non-existence. Hence God is in none of these ways
mutable, it belongs to Him alone to be altogethm i r n r n ~ t a b l e . ~

I t seems, then, that the act of existing actuates and preserves not only an actual
existent in some essential situation, but the essential situation is made to be the
essential situation it is by the act of existence. We need to see why that is because
it will reveal rnost clearly the creaturely status of creatures-effects dependent on
the first or the highest cause.
Keep in mind that we are still trying to account for the possibility of many
existents. Recall that the reason why this is a question a t al1 is that in the known
existents does not lie the reason why there are many of them. They are not many
because of their essence: essence may be one (tomato, for example), but there are
many existents in that same essential status. They are also not many simply because
they have the act of existing: one existent does not contain in it, as an existent, the
reason for many existents. Recall also the Thomistic understanding of the composite
of essence and existence. Essence denotes the essential features of an actual existent;
in addition to having these features an actual existent also exists, and this fact is
denoted by the act of existing. W e are not saying, strictly speaking, that, what
Sweeney calls "components," exist. It is the whole composite that properly speaking
exists, and it exists as the denominations of essence and existence indicate: through

3"ST,1, q. 9, a. 2. (italics mine) For earlier texts where St. Thomas makes the same point see De Vm.,
(which is earlier than the arguments for God's existence in SCG,1, 13) q. III, a. 6, and ad 3,4; q. III, a.
3. See also the later work De Pot., q. III, a. 1, obj. 17 and ad 17; q. V, a. 1, ad 1 and ad 12.
is not clear h m Bobik's discussion, in his commentary on De Ente et Essentia. of the composite
356 It
of essence and existence whether he in fact understands the composite this way. 1 suspect he does
not, but neither does he Say anything that calls in question this understanding. For that reason a
more developed discussion between him and his opponents may be necessary before we can decidedly
take sides.
its essence an actual existent is the kind of an existent that it is; through the act of
existing a Rind of existent actually does exist
W e have already pointed out that the act of existing does not, b y actuating it,
make essence more essential than it would be without the act of existing. But St.
Thomas does not thereby want to Say, along with Kant,* that existence does not
add anything at al1 to the essence. He maintains that essence is not able to exist
simply because it is essence, and also because in every actual existent there is an act
which is able to make an essence t o exist.
The point becomes clearer if we focus upon a possible existent. In speaking about
a possible existent we are speaking about a composite of essence and existence, of
the proper subject of to be (substance) and its to be. The essence component of a
possible existent denotes what is able to be. But in the Thomistic context what is
able cannot account for whether it is able. To deny this is to affirrn that to be able to
be something is identically t o be a this or a thing (an existent in this essential
status), or that the existent is identically the essential characteristics of the possible
sornething in question. For St. Thomas this cannot be the case with respect to
possible existents any more than it can be with respect to actual existents. And the
reason why for an actual existent to be is not identically t o be the essential status of
that existent is that it would then be impossible to have a multiplicity of existents
(both in different and same essential situations). But there are i n fact many
existents, and there must, therefore, be many possible existents. And given that
possible existents are composites, they can be, before they are, not only because of
the essential component (tornato, human), which is really the proper subject of to be

"See sweeney, Authentic Metaphpics, ch. 5.

358 See Immanuel Kant, Critique of Pure Reuson, trans. by N.K. Smith, (London: The Macmillan
Press, 1992), B 623 - B 630. pp. 502-507.
in an essential status, but also because of the existential component, which, in this
case, is a future act of existing.
If we now ask how a possible existent's substance component is related to its
future act of existing, we corne to the threshold of natural theology, one of two
special branches of the more general science of the philosophy of being as being. The
answer may be found in several of St. Thomas' texts. Consider first the following
objection:

Since the cause is more powerful than its effect, that which is possible to our intellect which
takes its knowledge from things [Erom existents considered through the component revealing
their essential status] wouid seem yet more possible to nature. Now our intellect can understand
a thing apart from understanding that it is from God, because its efficient cause is not part of a
thing's nature, so that the thing can be understood without it. Much more therefore c m there be
a real thing that is not from Gad:=

This objection reveals a viewing of existents exclusively as things, exclusively

through their essential component. When existents are so viewed, their dependence
on an efficient cause is not clear, and any philosophizing about God on the basis of
existents so viewed is impossible. This is a valuable lesson for viewing the data of
the Five Ways. How must we view the data in order to see the dependence upon a
cause that is first and highest? Here is St. Thomas' answer:

Although the first cause that is God does not enter into the essence of creatures, yet being which
is in creatures cannot be understood except as derived from the divine being: even as a proper
effect cannot be understood Save as produced by its proper c a u ~ e . ~

A possible existent's substance component is related, therefore, to its future act of

existing through the medium of a cause which enables an essence t o exist. Therefore,
the data of the Five Ways must be viewed as existents whose act of existing requires
a cause and actuates their essence.%'

- ~ Pot.,
e q. III, a. 5, obj. 1.
=1bid. ad. 1. See also a later text in ST, 1, q. 44, a. 1,ad 1. We shall consider this text in the second
section of chapter ten.
AS that which actuates an essence, the act of existing would appear t o be performing a causal
function. In ST, 1, q. 3, a. 4 St. Thomas says that "existence is that which makes every forrn or nature
actual." But a scholar like Bobik denies that the act of existing is an intrinsic cause. This, as Sweeney
 This reveals precisely the creaturely status of creatures; it reveals the status of
possible existents as possible. The reason why a future tomato is a possible existent
is not because it is a tomato, but because there is in fact that which generates a
tomato. Without a generator a possible tomato is nothing. W e often slip into
thinking that a possible tomato is a future existent without a generator because we
know zeihat it would be; we have an idea of it, and think that on the basis of the idea
we can infer its possibility of existing. But in fact, al1 we can infer from the idea is
what a possible existent is, and a what does not reveal a mhether, so to speak.
A generator or a cause is then also the reason for the multiplicity of existents. The
idea, technically termed ewemplar, of an existent defines it, but not as related to its
cause, therefore an exernplar cannot be the source of Our knowledge of u h y there are
in fact many existents. The multipiicity of existents can only be accounted for
through the cause of their being which is actually causing them or can cause them.
We shall obviously have to Say more about causality then we did in chapter six,
but it is clear from the foregoing discussion that in the Thomistic context causality
must include the act of existing. This throws much light on the difference between
Aristotle's and St. Thomas' First Uncaused Cause, and on the difference between
interpretations of the Five Ways as cosmological and as netaphysical.

points out, "is unfortunate, for what other component is so influentid in producing an existent?"
Authentic Metaphysicr, p. 236, n. 5.
 FROM BEING TO GOD
THROUGH THE FIRST CAUSE OF BEING
 CHAPTER IX

A Preface to God-Talk
A worried hippopotamur reflected irPlith a si&
How very strange that two of us nake trippopotani
But if the hipopotami, how stands the matter thus
That any hippopotarni are hippopotamus?

Gerard Smith, Naturd Theology

The aim of this chapter is to prepare further the context in which is situated the
intellectual activity of St. Thomas' demonstration of God's existence.
At this point of Our inquiry we must shift Our focus. Since the fifth chapter we
have been moving from the first philosophical question, the answer to which is
being, to the heart of the Thomistic understanding of being, namely, the act of
existing. We have encountered this act in a contingent being (a being that is but
need not be), which as such requires a cause. W e have said something about the
causality in the context of first principles of knowledge of contingent being. But
more needs to be said about i t because we are now looking for a cause that must
reside outside the realm of being as becoming, that is, outside the realm of human
experience. It must so reside because every being in experience is contingent
(requires a cause of its existence because it is not identically its act of existing). We
must, therefore, Say something about the manner of philosophizing about that which
we cannot experience. This p u b us on tricky ground. St. Thomas is well aware that
the ground is tricky, and that we must proceed carefully and clear of any illusions.
The main difficulty we shall encounter is deriving a working definition of that of
which we have no experience, namely, the cause of the act of existing that is itself in
no way caused, or "that which everyone calls God." Deriving at this definition
requires a shift in focus t o the philosophical context which can accommodate God-
talk, that is. we want to see how the intellectual activity of a metaphysician leads
into natural theology which properly commences with the proof for Godls existence.
This is the most difficult part of our quest for a good understanding of the Five
Ways. The difficulty resides in Our having to sustain a long and very attentive effort
in grasping every key point and then moving on to the next point without losing a
firm grasp of the previous one. The more points we shall make, the more difficult i t
will become to do this, but we must endure until we reach the conclusion of each of
the Five Ways. Even though 1 have broken it up into sections, the content of the
next three chapters is closely connected.
Before St. Thomas shows how God's existence can be demonstrated he considers
whether a demonstration is necessary at all, and once he shows that it is, he looks a t
some objections to the very possibility of demonstrating it. These are in his mind
the strongest objections anyone has put forth to date. W e must, therefore, consider
some modern objections to our task of seeking God with our minds.
1 shall follow the Theologian's two-phase rnethod for preparing the inquiry into
God's existence: the metaphysical phase where we consider why the existence of
God needs proof, and the epistemological phase where we consider some objections
to the possibility of the proof, and also begin to consider the nature of the proof.

Metaphysical Preface to God-talk

Either the proposition God exists does not need a proof because it is in some way
self-evident or it does; if it does, we need an explanation of hozu it is to be proved. In
this section we shall look at reasons for holding these two positions. (In the next
section we shall Say something about the claim that the proposition cannot be
proven.) But the two positions are not only a disagreement about the proposition
God exisa the disagreement between them goes deeper. It is a disagreement over
the nature of knowledge, and deeper yet, it is a disagreement over the nature of
being, since al1 knowledge is of being. To Say whether or not a proof, any proof, is
required is to Say what is required in order to know something (being). Thus al1
intellectual disputes are disputes over what beings are as beings (no one daims that
knowledge is not of being). I t will be remembered, for example, that Thales of
Miletus suggested they are water. Plato suggested that they are essences or Forms.
His position may be called essentialh> and i t gives rise to the claim that the
proposition God erists does not need a proof. St. Thomas' position on the nature of
being as being may be called existentialism, and it maintains that the proposition
God exists does need a proof. By comparing these two positions on several points we
shall better understand why for St. Thomas the proposition God exists needs a proof,
why it is not entailed in some concept from which it only needs to be extracted.
The essentialisrn of Plato, amounts roughly to this: being is an essence or
whatever can correctly be defined-fish, feline, man, and so on. Plato's essentialisrn
is his answer to the problern faced by al1 philosophers of being, namely the problem
posed by individual existents. The problem is this: how can the same essence-being,
fish, be more than one individual, and why are two individual fishes the same
essence-being,fish? Plato thought the only way out of this problem is to define

36LIn tagging a philosopher an "essentialist1' we must be careful. James Collins offers good advice.
"This division [of p hilosophers as essentialis ts or existentialists] can be misleading if by
"essentialism" is meant ignorance or depreciation of the problem of existence. In this sense, the
rationalists do not fit into this category; a concern for existence lies behind Descartes' view of the
Cogito, Spinoza's theory of the production of the world, and Leibniz's principle of sufficient reason.
But these thinkers do qualiS as essentialists if by that is meant their systernatic effort to award the
primacy to essence over existence in the order of being, as well as of thought." God in Modem
Phitosophy p. 79.
being apart from the redm of individual existents. This means that al1 individual
existents, as individual, reside more or less in the realm of unreality-the realm of
change and becoming. Because being is whut is, and nonbeing is whut is not, being is
one, immobile, and eternal; but individual existents are many, mobile (they change
and corne in and go out of existence), and temporal. To be, therefore, must mean to
be an essence, and not an individual and an imperfect instance of essence. Piato thus
defines being in terms of the what of what is, and assimilates the is of what is into the
zerhat-to be is to be a w h d or an essence.
But he realises that his position entangles the mind in some insurmountable
dificulties. For if to be means t o be an essence, our twofold problem-how can the
same essence-being be more than one individual, and why are two individual fishes
the same essence-being-remains. First, if to be is to be frrh, for example, the mind
cannot account for the difference between fish and several individual existents that
are fish, and yet clearly there is a difference, the difference between one Cfish) and
many (individual fishes). Second, before we even approach the question of why
several individual fishes are the same essence we notice that each individual fish
may not even be fish. For the fact that there are several fishes cannot be accounted
for by saying that al1 of them are one in their essence, for there is nothing in that
essence to account for multiplicity. This means that one fish is fish and it is the not
other fish. Therefore it must be made up of at least two essences: fish and the not
other fish, and so what we cal1 fish rnay turn out not to be a fish at all. The individual
existents are therefore a very thorny problem for essentialism, and it seems
necessary to deny them the status of beings or real things in order to preserve
essent ialism?

3a For a more detailed account of difficulties with essentiaiism see Plato's Sophiit, 242c-264b, and
Etienne Gilson's Being and Some Philosophers, ch. 1, (Toronto, 1952). For a more recent discussion
with Prof. Chisholm see Henry B. Veatch, "Essentialism and Individuation," Proceedings of the
American Catholic Philosophical Association, 48 (1974), pp. 64-73.
 Aristotle saw this and other problems with Platonic essentialism, and decided it
would be best to deny the assumption that to be is to be an essence or a form and to
assert the assumption that to be is t o be that which exists. The fact that existents
can also be defined in terms of essences or forms is no ground for positing archetypal
Forms or Essences outside the realrn of individual existents. The fact simply means
that we can properly locate essences, namely, in the things which exist, not outside
of them, and thus preserve individual existents which are the data of our knowledge
of being.
Nevertheless, the essentialism of Plato has pointed out correctly that our
knowledge of individual things is knowledge, rather than mere perception or
opinion, precisely because we know things universally. That is, we do not merely
perceive Peter and John, Mary and Ann, we know them as human beings; to know
Mary as human is to know her universally, as an individual instance of the universal
concept man (homo). Plato is thus a very healthy antidote to Hume's empiricism.
But we need not for this reason posit man outside of individual human beings; we
need not Say that things are universal or that there is a realm of universals; we can
simply say that Our knowledge of individual existing things is universal.
But how can it be that we have universal knowledge of things that are
themselves not universal? And, how is it possible that things be both individuals
and individuals of one particular kind? Aristotle answers both questions with two
principles he himself discovered: potency and act. With respect to the question of
the nature of human knowledge, the principles of potency and act give rise to the
possible and agent intellect? with respect to the things of our knowledge the
principles of potency and act give rise to prime matter, substantial form, and the

=Sec above note 223. For a more detailed account of possible and agent intellect and its relation to
potency and act, see Rgis, Epistemology, Parts Two and Three.
cause of their union? Thus for Aristotle the multiplicity of individuals of
particular kind is caused to be; individuals are caused to be by their formal, material,
efficient, and final causes; they are caused to be known universally by the sense data
they offer and the agent intellect which makes the data intelligible by abstraction.
But Aristotle's explanation of why there are many individuals of one kind is an
expianation that takes existence for granted, that is, Aristotle does not explain how
things corne to be, he explains how they come to be generated. Aristotle's answer to
the question: what is it to be an existent? is therefore not the answer of pure
existentialism, for he answers that to be an existent is to be an individual composite
of prime matter, substantial form, and accidents; he does not see them as composites
of essence and e x i s t e n ~ eSt.
. ~ Thomas takes note of this when he gives a brief
account of progress in philosophy on the question of origin of things. He sees the
earliest philosophers as conceiving being and the causes of being exclusively in
terms of matter. Others advanced further when they made the distinction between
substantial form, and matter which they thought to be eternal or uncreated. But

=TO see how this occurs, consult the works mentioned in note 283.
366~ o s e Owens
~h explains this point in his well known work. In discussing Aristotle's treatment of
Being peraccidens, he points out: "From the viewpoint of the much later distinction between essence
and the act of existing, this treatment must rnean that Aristotle is leaving the act of existence
entirely outside the scope of his philosophy. The act of existing must be wholly escaping his scientific
consideration. Ail necessary and definite connections between things can be reduced to essence. The
accidental ones do not follow from the essence. They can be reduced only to the actual existence of
the thing. There is no reason in the essence of the carpenter why he actually is a musician. The reason
has to be explained in terms of the actual existence of the habits in the same man. Likewise, the
results of free-choice cannot be explained in terms of essence. They form an existential problem.
AristotIe readily admits free will and what follows from it. But he does not allow it to form the
subject of scientific consideration. In a word, Aristotle does not for an instant deny existence. He
readily admits it in Being per a c c i d w . But he does not seem even t o suspect that it is an act worthy
of any special consideration, or that it is capable of philosophical treatment. To him it seems, 'as it
were, only a narne' and '&in to non-Being.' The difference in viewpoint can readily be seen in the
commentary of St. Thomas on this question. St. Thomas takes great pains t o show that the
contingent as well as the necessary must be immediately caused by the primary Being. For Anstotle,
on the contrary, Being per accidens finds its ultimate explanation in matter." The Doctnne of Being in
the Aristotelan 'Metaphysics', (Toronto: Pontifical Institute of Mediaevai Studies, 1978).pp. 309-10.
they accounted for the transmutation of forrns in bodies in ways that St. Thomas
does not find acceptable.

Such transmutations they attributed to certain universal causes such as the oblique circle [the
zodiac], according to Aristotle, or ideas, according to Plato ... Each of these opinions, therefore,
considered being under some particular aspect, either as this or as such; and so they assigned
particular efficient causes to things. Then others there were who arose to the consideration of
being, as being, and who assigned a cause to things, not as these, or as such, but as beings
[e'ustents]. Therefore whatever is the cause of things considered as beings, must be the cause of
things, not only according as they are such by accidentai onns, nor according as they are these
by substantial forms, but also according to al1 that belongs to their being at al1 in any way.=
The important question for us is whether Aristotle. with his substantialism,
which is an incomplete existentialism, can demonstrate God's existence. Another
way to put the question (and the reason for putting it this way will become clear in
the next section) is this: What can Aristotle's God do? What is Aristotle's God a
cause of? Given that Aristotle never treats philosophically the question of the
existence of existents, he is not in the position to discover the cause of existence,
and therefore not in the position to discover the existence of the First Cause.
Nevertheless, Aristotle does talk (philosophically) about the Unmoved Mover-a
deity different from a deity of any fourth-century Greek religion. He discovers the
Unmoved Mover as the cause of the process whereby individual existents produce
other individual existents of the same kind; the Unmoved Mover is the cause of the
proliferation of individuals, not of their existence. But if the existence of individuals
is not caused, two possibilities are open on the question of the origin of the existence
of things: either their essence is in some way responsible for their existence (which
would be a Platonic position), or the question is thought to be unimportant.
Aristotle took the second option. He never asked why there is sornething rather
than nothing, he took the existence of something, in whatever form, to be eternal
(which is not to Say causeless, but only that the contingent has always been in some

367
ST,1, q. 44, a. 2. See also De Spir. Creat. V where St. Thomas gives a more detailed description of
progress in philosophy and within a different context.
form and will always continue to be, and always as dependent on a cause, but not on
the cause of existence which he takes for granted and not worthy of scientific
consideration).
How then did t h e question of God's existence come t o be treated
philosophically? I t did because Christians began to ask philosophical questions.
One question they asked is whether they could know scientifically, that is through
an explanation of causes, what they accepted by faith, namely that the reason why
sornething exists rather than not is that God created it.= The Christians who first
asked this question had as their philosophical apparatus Platonic essentialism. The
best known of them is St. Augustine.
It does not, however, take a deep insight to see that the existence of God cannot
be demonstrated within the essentialist context. Given that, in this context, to be is
to be an essence and not an individual existent, to demonstrate God's existence
requires that he be shown as the cause of the existence of essence-beings, that is, of
fLFh, feline, man, and so on. But that is impossible because man or feline, which
according to essentialism do not reside in the realm of existence, cannot be made to
exist; only an individual thing which is man, Peter and Mary, or feline, Fifi and
Felix, can be made to exist. This is not to Say that essentialism denies that God can
create that which is intelligible and therefore universal in individual existents, and
in that sense to create essences. But any individual existent cannot be identically an

~3 It is true that Plato and Aristotle have what we cal1 "proofs for God's existence," but these
"proofsn do not arise from the question: Is it possible to demonstrate that God exists? They seem to
arise more from the question: What can be said about God? As an answer to this question we get
God as the First Cause, (but not of the act of existence in his effects) the Prime Mover, and so on,
but the existence of anything is for the Greeks never an object of a demonstration. This may have to
do with the fact that t h e ancients did not wonder about the existence of anything, they only tried to
explain how things are generated from other things. And so God is the ungenerated one, and the
question of his existence does not come up. Christians do not see things as only generated from other
things, but they see the world as .having had a beginning, as having come from no pre-existing matter,
which, philosophically gives rise to the question of the cause of the existence of things.
essence because that denies the possibility of existence to other individuals with the
same essence; such possibility cannot be blocked because there are actually many
individual existents with the same essence. Thus the inability of essentialism to deal
satisfactorily (without sacrificing the reality of actual individual existents) with the
problem of the one and the many disables it to prove the cause of the existence of
things. Furthermore, because essentialism cannot begin its demonstration with the
existence of anything, it cannot arrive at the existence of anything.
An essentialist conception of being has less than desirable repercussions on the
understanding of the nature of human knowledge as well. Given that knowledge is
of being, and being for an essentialist is an essence, ail knowledge of being must
corne into the human mind apart from the workings of the senses and the formation
of judgments by the agent intellect. This forces us to regard the presence of sensory
powers in human beings as puuling and perhaps not al1 that necessary for human
beings as human beings. (Recall Plato's and Descartes' regard of sensory powers in
man.) According to essentialism the human mind possesses unacquired and ready
made knowledge of essence-being; it does not begin with Peter and Ann, or Fifi and
Felix, but with man and feline. For an essentialist the knowledge of the universal, of
the necessary, of the essential, and of the possible, is given. What must be shown is
how we arrive at the knowledge of the singular, the contingent, the existent, and the
actual; what must be shown is how the given (essence-being) is the source of the
required (individual existents). Essentialism explains this by saying that the
knowledge of the universal, the necessary, the essential, and the possible are not
caused by the experience of an individual existent, but that the experience is merely

an occasion which stimulates in the mind the knowledge of essence-being that is

already t here.
Consequently, the essentialist proof of God's existence, whether it be St.
Augustine's, St. Anselm's, Descartes', or Leibniz's, is fairly straight forward. In fact
it is not really a proof because the knowledge of God's existence is contained in the
given and is therefore not required; it does not have to be demonstrated (in the
strict sense of demonstration) but only pointed out. What is given is an essence
whose nature it is to exist. It is true that most people do not know this given, just as
there may be some who do not know spinster which is also given and contains the
predicate unmarried. But that is irrelevant because some people (essentialist
philosophers) do in fact know the given essence whose nature it is to exist. So we
cannot not know that there exists a special being radically different from al1 other
beings because we must conceive an essence that in fact exists because its nature is
to exist. Therefore, God, who is a being above al1 beings, exists. Obviously this is not
a demonstration, but a mere unpacking of terms. For an essentialist, that is al1 we
need to do with the proposition God em'sts-
But for an existentialist like St. Thomas the matter is not so straight fonvard.
The main reason an existentialist disagrees with essentialisrn is that for him being
cannot be an essence; it cannot because individual existents must be preserved, they
are and we cannot make them not be. An existentialist wants to handle the problem
of the one and the many better than by denying the status of being to individual
existents, to that which is. Consequently he does not wish to deny the connection
between his universal knowledge of being and individual beings. He maintains that
our knowledge of essences fish,feZine, man is not given but acquired by our
knowledge of existents, which are given. For an existentialist this knowledge arises
as a product of two things: a) apprehending an existent, and b) apprehending in an
existent what he is, or his essence. We first know the singular, the sensible, the
actual, and the contingent, which when combined by the operation of the agent
intellect causes in us through abstraction the knowledge of the universal, the
intelligible, the possible, and the necessary. We know universals like species and
genus from the knowledge of a particular individual instance of them; we know an
essence like plant from knowing this plant in our back yard; we know what is
possible from knowing a particular thing that is actual; we know the necessary by
knowing that what we have first known to be cannot not be while it is. This process
of acquiring knowledge has been described in a little more detail in chapters seven
and eight?
The existentialist who depends for al1 his knowledge on experience cannot fnd
in his knowledge the existence of the one whose essence it is to exist. When an
existentialist is told of an essence whose nature i t is to exist, he is able to find in it
only the knowledge that the one who m u t be necessarily must be, just as when he is
told what a spinster is he knows only that a spinster must be unmarried. He does
not know whether there is in fact a spinster. In the same way, when told about the
essence of the one whose nature it is to exist, the existentialist knows only that such
a one must be thought to exist, not that he does in fact exist.
What then are the requirements of an existentialist's proof for God's existence?
The question can best be answered by seeing the contrast between essentialism with
existentialism on the following point. In "proving" God's existence essentialism
merely moves from knowledge to knowledge; it allows one knowledge to be the
cause of another knowledge. In "proving" God, essentialism makes its knowledge of
the one whose essence it is to be the cause of its knowledge of the existence of the
one whose essence it is to be. Existentialism, on the other hand, while not opposing
this, insists on a causality of being (of that which actually exists) because al1 its
knowledge is caused by being (by that which actually exists). Gerard Smith puts
the point this way: "Essentialism conceives proof only as a causality of subsequent
knowledge by prior knowledge; existentialism conceives proof as an instance of the

36eSeealso SCG II, 76,14 & 17 and De Ver., q. X,a. 6.

causality of being [that which is or can bel, because the caused sequence of
knowledge is the caused sequence of being which is k n ~ w n . " ~
We must clarify this point in order to see the difference between essentialist and
existentialist contexts of a proof, and so better to make up our minds between them,
for they are not compatible and cannot both succeed in demonstrating the existence
of God. At this point I ask the reader to sustain attention through a fairly lengthy
clarification that involves a cluster of points. Let me, therefore, restate the point
that needs clarifying. We wish to show that a demonstration or a proof is a
demonstration of some instance of the causality of being, because, given that
knowledge is of being (that which is or can be and not of essence-being), a caused
sequence of knowledge must duplicate a caused sequence of being (not a mere
sequence of knowledges as in the ontological or essentialist proof).
We shall take the example we used in chapter seven to show how the knowledge
of the act of existing can become for us a distinct knowledge, the exarnple of an
existent man. Suppose that we do not know that man is an animal, but that we do
know that a sentient being is an animal. What we are missing is the middle t e m ;
man is a sentient being. When we find it, we will know that man is an animal. Both
the essentialist and the existentialist have this as their goal. Now, at first glance it
would seem that we are dealing here exclusively with universal propositions: man is
an animal, sentirnt 5eirig is aii onimal, man is a sentient being. And that suggests that
the job of finding Our middle term would be best accomplished by essentialism,
without making reference to any individual existents. In fact such a reference would
seem to be irrelevant and only a nuisance, for universal propositions are true
regardless of the existence of individual beings (in this case individual human
beings).

"Gerard Smith, "Before You Start Talking About God", (The M o d m Schoolman, 23 (1945) p. 30.)
1 am indebted to this article for my cornparison of essentialism with existentialism.
 1 Say it would seem because it is not true, at least there is no evidence to support
it. It is true that universal statements deal with the relationship of essences, but
because the universal statements express the relation of essences which are based on
the very essences in question, we must ask what it means to grasp an essence. Here
the essentialist and the existentialist are exactly opposed to one another. We have
just seen the difference in their positions. Existentialist claims that the knowledge
of universal statements is caused by existents and the agent intellect; essentialism
claims that essence-being which is ready made in Our minds cornes to the forefront
of Our minds upon experience of an existent, in other words, it does not need to be
grasped. But the existentialist will argue that essence-being is not being because
individual existents are real (actually existing), and that consequently knowledge of
essences cannot be the knowledge of being; thus to know an essence is not to know a
being as it is, but only as it is known-jish, jeline, man is not, does not exist,
although it is how we know Fifi and Fluffy, Peter and Am.
Which of them is right depends on whether being or that which exists or can
exist is an essence. As far as I know, no proof can be offered for either a yes or a no
answer, which to me indicates the deeply mysterious nature of being. However, we
can make up our minds between them.
The essentialist, who says that being is an essence, at the same time denies that
we know what exists or can exist, and claims that the object of our knowledge is
that in which existence is not given, namely an essence. This leaves him with
knowing not beings but that which has its home in a world no one has ever lived, a
world of ideas rather than a world of individual existents like ours. Consequently,
an essentialist does not know what actually is, he knows zoihat is as known, he knows
ideas but not being.
The existentialist cannot reply with a counter-proof which would show that
being is not essence or that Our knowledge is not disconnected from existents, nor
can he offer a proof that things exist or that we know existing things. However, no
evidence of any kind can be put forth t o support the essentialist's position. The
existentialist has on his side at least the evidence of the senses. Our sense of sight,
hearing, touch, and so on, and Our sciences about things serve as evidence that there
are things and that we know them; although that does not constitute a proof. On
the other hand, no evidence has been found that being is essence or that we know
essences apart from knowing existents. Furthermore, and this is where we as
philosophers seeking to demonstrate the existence of God perk up Our ears, there
can be a proof that one being exists if another being exists and we know it to be so.
But if being is an essence and knowledge is not of things, no proof that anything
exists can (not just isn't) be offered-al1 that can be offered is a sequence of ideas
logically connected.
W e are now in the position to return to Our example of demonstrating the
proposition man is an animal in which al1 the statements are universal or essential:
sentient being is an animal, man is a sentient being, and man is a n animal. An
existentialist will Say that these essential statements are related because they are
based on essences, but essences are known through experience of actual existents,
and the proof that man is an animal is true in the realm of being (existents). Because
essentialism severs the connection between essences and existents the proposition
man is sentient is true in knowledge only, that is, in a world other than the world of
existents, in an ideal world for which there is no evidence of any kind.
Existentialism keeps the connection between essences and existents, and
consequently is able to daim that the proposition man is sentient is true in
knowledge because man is in fact, in the world of existents, sentient.
This reveals the requirement of a proof (we are still clarihing our point). In a
proof of any sort offered by an existentialist, individual existents are presupposed,
that is, their actual existence is not dernonstrated. Furthermore, individual existents
bring objects into knowledge and maintain them there. If individual existents do
not introduce an object of knowledge, as they do not in essentialism, we shdl not be
able to explain how it is that we know any actually existing thing, when in fact we
do know actually existing things (in essentialism we know essences, not things).
Finally, if individual existents do not introduce and maintain an object of
knowledge, we cannot know what is possible and what is necessary because we
cannot know what is actual. In other words, without individual existents we cannot
have a science of any kind, but we do in fact have many sciences each studying its
own aspect of being and with its own methods of demonstration. In essentialism
there cannot really be scientific knowledge, but only recollection. This is as much as
existentialism can offer in support of its position on being and knowledge of being.
We need to establish further the requirements of an existentialist proof of God's
existence; this time in the context of an existentialist refutation of an essentialist
proof of God's existence. The essentialist proof in question is that of St. Augustine.
It is true that, strictly speaking, St. Augustine is not an essentialist. He is a
creationist, but the beings which God creates are for him essences, and, as we have
seen, essence-beings are incapable of being created because they do not come into
existence. This is why for St. Augustine human knowledge is owed to God who puts
into the mind essential truths. Accordingly, we do not participate by o u r own effort
in the formation of Our knowledge; we are divinely illuminated in al1 areas of our
knowledge, and thus not really scientists, not really studying individual existents.
This picture is reflected very clearly in one of St. Augustine's proofs of God. In
Book II of his On Free Choice, St. Augustine explains how we can see that God
exists, better yet, how we cannot deny, as does the fool who says in his heart that
there is no God, that God is real. Any essential truth will suffice for the
demonstration: fiue isfiue, seven and three are ten, etc. It will suffice because it has a
threefold characteristic: it is necessary, eternal, and immutable-seven and three
must be ten, seven and three are always ten, seven and tree can only be ten. When
we ask ourselves what is the source of these characteristics of essential truth, we
must admit that it is not any ten existents in the world because these are neither
necessary, nor eternal, nor immutable. Neither can the source be our mind which
only sees or recognises an essential truth, but does not make it. Therefore, an
essential truth like seven and three are ten indicates a truth that transcends
creatures because creatures do not possess the characteristics it possesses, and such
a t m t h must be a participant in the Tmth which itself does not participate in any
other truth. That is God. But this is a recognised God, not a demonstrated one
because in essentialisrn al1 knowledge is recognition or recollection, and not science,
or demonstration.
But notice what we have here. We have God, creatures (individual existents),
and an essential truth like seven and three are ten which is neither God nor a
creature. From a Christian perspective this is dangerous, but fortunately it is also
false. The falsity of it can best be seen in the following argument based on St.
Thomas.
St. Thomas discusses the matter apropos of the number six because Augustine had remarked that
if the creatures which God made in six days were not existent, nevertheless six would still be a
perfect six. (Quodlibet., 1, 8, 1) St. Thomas first points out that if there were no existent sixes,
there would not be-careful man-any existent sixes. Next, he remarks, six can be taken as an
idea in God, where, because it is not a creature but rather a divine idea of a creature, it is the
same as God Himself. Then comes the crucial point: what is six apart from its being a divine idea
of a creature and apart from its being a creature, i.e., six existents? It is, he answers, an absolute
consideration of number six. Absolute consideration, he exptains. is a consideration in which six is
viewed neither as six existents nor as the thought of six. In this absolute consideration six is not
six existents, because six is six, whether there be six things or not; nor is six the thought of six,
because six is six, whether we think six or not. Absolute thus means freed from the conditions of
being six things and of being the thought of six. In that absolute state the only thing t m e of six is
simpIy and soleIy that it is six [not that it is a participant of anything above it, which it may
be, but it c a ~ obet known to be that when it is considered absolutely]. Absolute consideration
is knowledge which abstracts six both from the state of being six existents and from the state
which six assumes in our knowledge of six, the state, narnely, of being thought of. Now cornes the
delicate point: that absolute six, although it is considered as being neither in nature nor as being
in knowledge, is nevertheless only in knowledge, precisely because it cannot be so considered
except by considering it. The absolute six is thus in knowledge alone in the sense that it is never
found outside its status of being understood, although the fact that it is understood is irrelevant
 to the fact that it is six which is understood. Seven or eight or ten, etc., could be understood just
as ~ e 1 1 . ~ ~ '

The point of this argument, the one Smith calls delkate, is of utrnost importance
for a demonstration of God's existence like the Five Ways because i t is a serious
objection to the essentialist claim that essential tmths corne neither from individual
existents nor the mind. The point, in showing that essentialism is mistaken in
claiming the status of an absolute nature, brings out the need for a demonstration of
truths that are not self-evident.
The alternative to essentialist position is this: absolute natures, the natures upon
which we make absolute judgments (like the nature of six and the judgrnent that six
is six) are from the mind and individual existents. According to St. Thomas the
mind causes knowledge, that is, absolute natures and absolute judgments have their
being in thought, they would not be what they are unless they were thought. But to
Say that we cause our knowledge, or that we make the tmth of oui- knowledge is not
to Say that we could also unmake it so that seuen and three would be something
other than ten. The point is that unless the mind cause knowledge there will not be
knowledge, that is, we shall not have knowledge. But this is not idealism because al1
knowledge is of being, that is, being is the content of knowledge even if it is of our
making; the content of knowledge is not whatever the mind makes up, i t is the
content caused by being in Our knowledge. In making this assertion St. Thomas does
not, as do al1 the essentialists from Plato to Hegel, dissociate the knower from the
known, the intellect which knows being from actually existing being. For St.
Thomas knowledge can only be of being (that which is or can be), and in light of
that he says that we cause Our knowledge and the truth of our knowledge, and the
effect of Our intellect's cause is being which we feel, see, hear, and so on, and which

371
Gerard Smith, "Before You Start Tdking ..." p. 37. For a similar argument, although in a different
context, see Darko PiknjaC, "A Thomistic Reply to Logical Fatalism", (The Proceedings of the PMR
Conference, vol. 19/20, 1994-1996.pp. 189-197.)
the agent intellect makes intelligible. Put briefly, being (that which is or can be)
causes Our intellect to cause knowledge?
For an existentialist, therefore, a dernonstration of knowledge, or a proof, is
achieved by means of the middle terrn,mwhich is an existential principle of known
individual existents, and not, as in Augustine's "proof," of essence-being that cornes
neither from the mind nor from individual existents. It is true that the middle term
is an essence of an individual existent, but the essence cornes from the intellect
which gets its content hom being (that which is), and that content is the essence of
an actual or a possible existent?
But an essentialist may object on the grounds that t m t h of absolute judgments is
eternal. The Theologian responds this way:

The eternity of the truth which the soul understands calls for a distinction. In one way, this
eternity can be taken to refer to the thing understood; in another, to that by which it is
understood. In the first case, the thing understood would be eternal, but not the one who
understands; in the second, eternity would be on the side of the soul which understands. Now,
the understood truth is eternal, not in the Iatter but in the former reference; since the intelligible
species, whereby our soul understands tnith, come to us repeatedly from the phantasrns through
the operation of the agent intellect."
Now if St. Thomas admits that the content of truth is eternal, how is his
existentialism different from essentialism? Does not the middle term of his
demonstration still have to contain an eternal tnith as it does in essentialism? The
difference lies in their understanding of the content of the eternal truth. For an
essentialist the content is an essence, or what things are, and one can understand an
essence of a thing, like fish, man, six without bringing in any consideration of God's
existence. One can do so because the efficient cause does not enter into an

372
Seest-Thornas'ST, 1, q. 16, a. 7; 1, q. 84,a.5; De Ver., q. 1, a. 5; q. XI, a. 1;De Pot.,q. III, a. 5.
m In an Aristotelian sylIogisni there are three terms: major which is the predicate of the major
premise and of the conclusion, minor which is the subject of the minor premise and of the conclusion,
and middle which is the subject of the major premise and the predicate of the minor premise, and it
does not appear in the conclusion. Dictionaty of ScholasticPhilosophy, p. 123.
n4For a discussion of the rniddle term in the Five Ways see the first section of chapter ten below.
SCG,II, 84,4
individual existent's essence. For St. Thomas, however, being "which is in creatures
[that is. in the content of truth] cannot be understood except as derived from the
divine being [and it is there that i t is eternal]."Jm
The Theologian is here pointing out the difference between essence and
knowledge of essence of a thing, and being (that which can or does exist) and
knowledge of being. For him, essence is not being, it is something that has being, or
the what of a being. Also, to know essence is not to know being, and even less is it to
know another being like a cause. But to know that which is o r can be is to know
being, and because it is to know contingent being, such knowledge involves the real
possibility of knowing the cause of contingent being.
Therefore, for St. Thomas the content of any truth is not an eternal essence, it is
a creature or contingent being (that which is or can be). Regardless of whether the
mind acquires the content of knowledge by inductive or deductive reasoning, the
true conclusion of existential reasoning either affirms o r denies that its content is or
can be because the antecedent premises have to do with being (that which is or can
be). Let us take again our example of the proposition man is an animal. When this
proposition is known by an existentialist it is understood, not as identifjring man-
animal with being (which would prevent the possibility of a being that is not man-
animal), but as associating actual or possible existence with an essence. The
association is demanded by experience, whereas the identification is foreign to
experience and there is no evidence for i t whatsoever. Our proposition is true when
it States the essence of an actual or a possible existent, but the source of its truth
does not lie in identifying being with essence; the source of its truth is either
induced from the data of experience or deduced from principles which also arise
from experience. The data of experience is always contingent and therefore caused

376
De Pot., q. III, a. 5, ad 1. See also obj. 1.
being; from the content of such knowledge we can never extract the knowledge of
necessary or uncaused being by mere analysis of a concept of it.
With this we have finaily shown why a proof or a demonstration cannot, for St.
Thomas, be a mere sequence of knowledges (as it is for those offering the ontological
proof, and for those who are offering a cosmological proof but pay no attention to
the act of existing) but must be a sequence of knowledges which duplicates the
caused sequence of being-the stuff of knowledge.
Let us with one last illustration dispense with the ontological argument (which,
as should be clear by now, is much better termed essentialist argument because of
the identification of being and essence that underlies it). Because every version of
this argument takes as its starting point some "eternal truth", we shall do the same:
seuen and three are ten. Now it is clear that there can be no proof of there being ten
things because it is evident that there are ten things. Nor is there proof of the
possibility of ten things because actual ten things rnake this possibility self-evident.
However, chat to be or to be able t o be is to be ten or to be able t o be ten is neither
evident nor self-evident. If to be were to be ten, there would be nothing else but ten,
but there is more than ten (flower, moon, two,). How then, if it is neither evident
nor self-evident, is it that ten is or that ten is able to be? We may put the question
another way: Why is it that being accrues to ten or that it can accrue to ten?
Essentialism, if it is consistent, will answer: being does not accrue to ten, it is ten. -
But that is impossible because it prevents the possibility of flower, moon, two, etc.,
which are clearly actual. If, then, we admit that there is o r can be ten, and that it is
not ten only because it is ten, we must also admit that ten is or can be because it is
made or caused to exist." To show, therefore, that being accrues to ten is to have a
proof. In the order of contingent being, a proof shows cause and effect. In the order

We shall see below that existence has two modes. Thus ten does not exist in the sarne mode that
the moon does.
of knowledge of contingent being, a proof shows that the knowledge of cause and
effect necessarily involves us in knowing that there is a cause or effect of the beingof
that cause and effect. It seems, then, that our final step of preparation for a
profitable reading of the Five Ways is a close consideration of causality as it is
understood by St. Thomas, because a proof of God involves a relationship between
effects and their proper cause. The question is: along what lines of that relationship
can the existence of God be demonstrated? But before we take that step we must
hear a few objections to the very possibility of a proof for God's existence which will
help us establish the context for a proof that involves effects and their proper cause.

Epistemological Preface to God-tak

In this section we shall consider some objections to a demonstration of God's
existence by those who Say that it cannot be demonstrated. Also, we shall consider
what for St. Thomas a proof of God's existence is, and what and how it proves.
We have said enough up to this point to be able to see how the object of natural
theology arises; we have corne to that which gives rise to the intellectual activity of a
natural theologian. Since al1 knowledge is of being, and given that the hurnan
intellect begins its work in the experience of contingent being, which means caused
being, and given also that the contingency of contingent being is most clearly
pronounced at the level of the act of existing of contingent being, the natural
theologian goes to work precisely at the moment when he seeks to discover the
cause of the act of existing in contingent beings. But he cannot find this cause
among the beings of his experience because al1 beings of experience are contingent,
and therefore caused; al1 of them have a borrowed act of existing. The existence of
the cause of the act of existing of al1 contingent being must, therefore, be inferred
and concluded upon philosophical reflection of the beings that lend themselves to
the natural theologian's experience.
 But making such an inference and a conclusion means positing this cause as a
necessary term of a demonstration. This requircs evidence, and the human intellect
c m gather evidence only within the realm of contingent being where such a cause
cannot be experienced. This evidence will have to be a knowledge of material
sensible being that allows the mind to see the necessity of positing the existence of
an immaterid supreme Being.
This is by no means easy, and objections to it are many. T h e first objection we
shall consider is based on the nature of human knowledge. Philosophers like
Aristotle and St. Thomas maintain that principles of demonstration are known by
the human intellect through the senses. "He [Aristotle] says therefore first that if a
penon lacks any of the senses, Say sight or hearing, then necessarily the science of
the sensible objects proper to those senses will be l a ~ k i n g . But
" ~ God exceeds every
sense faculty and is above all sensible beings. It follows that a demonstration of
God's existence dependent on principles known through the senses cannot succeed.
A short answer to the objection has already been given in what we have said in
chapters six and seven. The principles of demonstration that corne from sensible
beings, are not for St. Thomas principles of sensible beings, they are not principles of
their essence; they are principles of sensible beings insofar as they are beings (that
which is or can be), which is to Say, insofar as they share in the act of existence.
Such principles are therefore valid for reaching by way of demonstration the
supreme Being which, even though not sensible, nevertheless possesses existence.
But this objection is also an objection to the possibility of the science of being as
being, or metaphysics, and as such it requires a longer answer. I t is clearly a modern
objection, stemming from the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, and it carries
with it the connotation that rnuch of the intellectual activity of ancient and

Cornrnentanjon the Post&orAnalytics of Alictotle, Book 1, lect 30.

medieval philosophers was not really "scientific," did not really have certainty on its
side because certainty can be acquired only through mathematics and physics.
One strange characteristic of many modern philosophers is their occasional
illusion that they have discovered something their predecessors did not know, that
they have broken new and original ground which gives them a great advantage over
the achievements of old philosophers. Was St. Thomas ignorant of the supreme
certainty of mathematics and the empirical sciences? Do we owe the awareness of
this certainty t o modern philosophers? The illusion of supremacy in modern
thinkers stems largely from their ignorance of the works of their predecessors.
When we turn to St. Thomas we find him wide awake. Of mathematics he says, "it is
clear, then, that mathematicai inquiry is easier and more certain than physical and
t heological;" of physics he says,

demonstration takes place through extrinsic causes, [and there] something is proved of one thing
through another thing entirely external to it. So the method of reason is particularly observed in
natural science; and on this account natural science among al1 the others is most in conformity
with the human intellect. Consequently, we Say that natural science proceeds rationally, not
because this is crue of it alone. but because it is especially characteristic of it.m

St. Thomas is as impressed with the certainty of mathematics as is Descartes,

and, had he known it, would be no less impressed with the physics of Newton than
Kant. The difference between the Theologian and the two modern thinkers is that
he sees no reason why we should want to make mathematical and physical methods
of inquiry the paradigm for all inquiry. But Cartesian and Kantian criticisms of
scholastic metaphysics amount to the claim that it is doomed to failure because it
either lacks the certainty of mathematics or attempts to stretch methods of physics
into metaphysics as if such a method is the only one i t could possibly have. Kant is
very proud of his discovery that metaphysical conclusions cannot be reached

The Divinon and Methods of the Sciences, VI, a. 1,ed. cit.

through physical demonstration; that speculative reason, bound to the realm of
experience, cannot demonstrate the existence of God.
But St. Thomas could reply, "This has nothing to do with rny attempt to
demonstrate Gad's existence. Such criticism does not apply t o my existentialist
metaphysics." Why could he Say so? The reason is precisely reason. St. Thomas and
Kant give different accounts of reason. What is missing in Kant's account of human
cognition is intellect. He talks about sensibility, imagination, understanding
(Verstand), and at the top is reason (Vmunft). But from St. Thomas' standpoint
Kant's account lacks intellectus, which is above reason and also its ongin? I cannot
here give a detailed account of St. Thomas' conception of human cognition in which
can be seen the full impact of his daim that intellect is the highest in Our knowledge
and that it is the origin of reason. But his main point is that reason is the discursive,
stepwise activity of the intellect in human beings.
The human intellects obtain their perfection in the knowIedge of truth by a kind of rnovement
and discursive intellectual operation; that is to Say, as they advance from one known thing to
another. But, if from the knowledge of a known principle they were straightway to perceive as

"O SCG, 1, 57, 8. For an excellent study of Thomistic understanding of human cognition see Rgis'
Episternology.
"Reason and intellect are not distinct powers of the soul; they are distinct acts of the sarne power.
The act of intellect is 'to apprehend intelligible truth simply'; the act of reason is 'to advance from
one thing understood [by the intellect] to another, so as to know an intelligible truth ... Reasoning,
therefore, is compared t o understanding (intelligere) as movement is to rest, or acquisition to
possession.' St. Thomas, Surnma Theol. 1.79.8. Hence the act of inte1Iect or understanding is a simple
intuition (intuitus) o r grasping of an intelligible object present to the intellect. See St. Thomas, In I
Sent. d. 3, q. 4, a. 5." Armand Maurer's note 36 on p. 71 of his translation of De ente et essentia.
Upon hearing that, as according to Kant, we cannot know the essence of a thing (or as it is in
itseIf) but only as i t appears, St. Thomas may well reply that in such a philosophy intellect has lost its
rightful place. "The word intellectus (understanding) implies an intimate knowledge, for intelligere (to
understand) is the same as intus legere (to read inwardly). This is clear t o anyone who considers the
difference between intellect and sense, because sensitive knowledge is concerned with external
sensible qualities, whereas intellective knowledge penetrates into the very essence of a thing, because
the object of the intellect is what a thing is." ST, 11-11, q. 8, a. 1. Of course, if one does not consider the
difference between intellect and sense and g e t t h e story of their differences and proper relation
seraight, his philosophy rnay end up in any number of modern predicarnents.
 known al1 its consequent conchsions, then there would be no discursive process at d l ... [human
beings] would a t once behold ail things whatsoever that can be known in t h e n B 1

Thus if we were not rational but purely intellectual, we could see (intellectually
intuit) everything that follows from first principles; we would see the necessity of
God's existence immediately and without demonstration entailed in the first
principles, which, because they are of being, entail being itself. But as things are, we
need to demonstrate, using reason, what follows from first principles. And this
demonstration must have as its starting point the first principles of being and
knowledge. Because Kant thinks that metaphysical attempts to demonstrate God's
existence are instances of reasoning without dependence on intellectual conception
of first principles, he condemns it as a rational activity of the physicist who
unjustifiably transcends his domain. But St. Thomas sees the situation differently.
"The certitude of reason comes from the intellect [not from what Kant says it does].
Yet the need of reason is from a defect in the intellect [which is its inability to see
simply and immediately everything that follows from its p r i n c i p l e ~ ] . "This
~
difference is of utmost importance for answering whether God's existence can be
demonstrated philosophically. For Kant reason is neither intellect nor a mode of
intellectual knowledge; it is the mind's application of twelve categories to
empirically given data, and that is why God's existence cannot be philosophically
demonstrated. To St. Thomas human intellectual activity looks very different.

W e can say that just as t h e method of physics is taken from reason inasmuch as i t gets its object
from the senses, and t h e method of divine science [metaphysics] is taken from t h e intellect
inasmuch as i t understands something purely and simply, so also the method of mathematics can
be taken from reason inasmuch as it obtains its objects from the imagination ... just as we
attribute the rational method to natural philosophy because it adheres most closely to the
method of reason, so we attribu te the intellectual method to divine science [metaphysics]
because it adheres rnost closely to the method of intellect-=

- - -- - - -

381
ST, 1, q. 58, a. 3.
3aL
ST, 11-11,q. 49, a. 5, ad. 2.
= ~ t Thomas
. Aquinas, Division and Method of the Sciences, q. VI, a. 1, ed. cit.
 The Theologian is saying that natural sciences have reason as their main tool,
but metaphysics has intellect. The import this has on the Five Ways cannot be
better explained than Gilson does in one of his lesser known lectures.
In each of them [St. Thomas' arguments for God's existence], there is a dialectical reasoning about
the cause (or causes) of certain mode of being such as motion, possibility, perfection and the like.
This dialectical process is the work of reason, that is, of intellect proceeding in a discursive w q .
Without this discursiveness, there would be no conclusion; there would, therefore, be no
demonstration, no proof of the existence of God. W e reason when we Say that whatever is moved is
moved by another; then in explaining the cause of this assertion, narnely, t h a t the same thing
cannot be a t once in potency and in act in the sarne respect. Kant was right in observing that
reason could go on indefinitely in thus accounting for a particular cause by another cause. Only, at
a certain moment, Thomas Aquinas says that "this cannot go on to infinity." At that moment
intellect is stepping in and, this time intellect is not speaking as reason, it is speaking as intellect. A
faculty of the principles, intellect sees everything as related to the notions of being and of unity. Its
contribution to the proof thus is a twofold one. First i t moves reason (or itself qua reason) to ask
the question and to investigate it. Left done, reason as such would content itself with connecting
particular causes to particular causes and do so indefinitely. It would not look for a cause of al1
causes. Science does n o t ask such a question, because science is the work of reason. Next, intellect
answers the question; a t teast, i t makes the answer possible. Itself seeking unity, intellect cannot
fail to find a t the term of its reasoning the very notion that released its mechanism. Of itself, reason
could very well go on t o infinity; in the case of Aristotle, it actually did. Intellect is that which
stops the reasoning process, because it sees everything in the Iight of being and unity. Reasoning
cornes to an end as soon as intellect redises that the very pxinciple that set the whole operation in
motion is also t h e true answer to the problem. Asked by intellect, the question can be answered
only by intellect ... the metaphysician is using the power of knowing in man which more closely
resembles that of the angels and ultimately that of God who, since Me is absolute Being, knows
everything by knowing Himself. The metaphysician is a mere man; his only privilege, if indeed it is
one, is to be a man interested in First Philosophy and thereby committed to t h e consideration of
the First Principles known in t h e Iight of the highest cognitive human power, narnely, intellect.
A proper understanding of this point discloses the true nature of the Five Ways. Those of us who
do not find them conclusive are sirnply asking for a demonstration of the very principle of these
demonstrations. We ask for proofs of that which makes proof possible. W e forget that intellect is
the proper instrument of metaphysical knowledge and that the proper function of intellect is not to
demonstrate, but to see. This is why al1 rational demonstrations either go on t o infinity and fail to
demonstrate or, contrariwise, proceed from a pnnciple and return to it, in which case they do not
go on to infinity and are able to conclude ... Each and every one of the Five Ways, then proceeds,
through rational argumentation, from the sight of a principle to the sight of t h e s m e principle.
Without the dialectical discourse there would be no roof, without the intellectual intuition of the
principle, the proof would never reach its conclusion. E
This does not make the Five Ways an instance of circular reasoning, which
would be a vicious circle;= it is circular intellection which is not vicious. In St.

Etienne Gilson, T a n the Existence of God Still Be Dernonstrated?" in The McAuley Lectures
1960, (West Hartford: St. Joseph College, 1961). pp. 8-9. This article is a very helpful discussion of
the differences between Thomistic and Kantian epistemologies which explain why St. Thomas can
attempt a demonstration of God's existence and Kant cannot.
3LS It would be vicious because it would run contrary t o t h e very nature of rationality, which we have
Thomas' epistemology, reasoning, because it is a part of intellection, proceeds from
principles (which it does not ask to have demonstrated because they are self-
evidently true) and returns t o them. Kant does not and cannot, with his purely
dialectic reason, successfully explain why reason is tempted t o produce
transcendental Idea of God, which is an idea of that which transcends experience.
But for St. Thomas reason, as the child of intellect, begins to look for a prime cause
of motion, efficiency, necessity, and existing because the intellect tends by virtue of
what it is to an absolutely prime cause, an unconditional necessity and absolute
being. Thus it is not experience that gives rise t o the mind's need t o arrive a t a
necessary conclusion, rather the need arises from intellectual necessity, from the
intellect's grasp of the first principles. The circle of intellection is not vicious
because the beginning and the end are one, but to know that they are one, the
human sou1 must have recourse to reasoning which it cannot perform without sense
experience. That is why St. Thomas' proofs begin with an observation from
experience, but the activity of proving is intellectual, (and therefore metaphysical)
which is more than merely rational, although it includes it.
Maritain describes the opposing Kantian and Thomistic understandings of the
human mind and of metaphysics this way.

Kant denied to metaphysics the character of science because for him experience was the product
and the terminus of science, since science built it by appIying to sensible data necessities which
are pure forrns of the mind. But St. Thomas recognised in metaphysics the supreme science of the
natural order because for him experience is the starting point of science, which, reading within
the sensible "given" the intellectual necessities that surpass it, can transcend it by following
those necessities and thereby achieve a supraexperimentd knowledge that is absolutely certain.
Being is, indeed, the proper object of the intellect; it is emboweIled in al1 its concepts; and it is
to being, wrapped up in the data of the senses, that Our understanding is first of al1 carried.
Should it se this object of its concept free so as to look a t it in itself, insofar as it is being, it sees
that it is not exhausted by the sensible realities in which the intellect first discovered it; it has a
supraexperimental value. So, too, have the principles based on it. In that way, the intellect, if 1

seen explained by St- Thomas as a demonstration that takes place through extrinsic causes where
something is proved of one thing through another thing entirely external to it. Thus if we attempt to
prove something in terms of itself, we have not succeeded in giving a rational demonstration; we have
simply been caught in a vicious circle.
 may Say so, "loops the loop," in coming back, to grasp it metaphysically and transcedentally, to
that very same being which was fint giver. to it in its first understanding of the sensible?

The next objection t o proving God's existence is based on the nature of God.
The complaint is that because all natural theologians daim that in God his essence
is identical with his existence, asking what God is and whether he exists is the same
question. But a natural theologian like St. Thomas says that we do not a t present
know what God is, therefore, neither should we be able to know whether God is.
This objection overlooks the distinction between two senses of "knowing
existence." Maurice Holloway, foilowing St. Thomas, explains.
Existence or "to be" can be taken in two senses. First, it can mean that intrinsic act or perfection
of a being by which it exercises external actudity-the intrinsic possession of the act of &ence.
Or, secondly, "to exist" o r "to ben can refer to the mind's affinnation of existence. Here the mind
asserts or affirms that something is or exists, because it is moved by evidence to make this
assertion.337

Accordingly the human intellect in its present state cannot know God's existence
that is identical with his essence. To know it would be to know God as he is in
himself. But the mind can formulate and affirm t h e proposition God exists The
point can be made another way; the intellect can demonstrate God's existence as a
true fact,but not as a perfection. 1shall Say more about this in replying to the next
objection.
Our last objection cornes from logic. A proper demonstration requires a middle
term (see n. 373, p. 205) that allows for a move t o a conclusion; it allows it because
it is a definition which serves as a means of demonstrating the thing in question. But
the human intellect cannot formulate a real definition of God's nature (which at
present it does not know), and therefore it cannot have the middle term necessary
for a conclusive demonstration of God's existence; the intellect cannot Say this exists
because it cannot formulate a definition of this,which would give it a real definition.

38S~ a c ~ u Maritain,
es The Degrees of Knowkdge, p. 71.
387Maurice R Holloway, An Introduction to Nahtral Theolog, (New York: Appleton-Century-Crofts,
Inc., 1959). p. 51.
In order to answer this objection we must make a fairly detailed account of the kind
of proof that the Five Ways are, an account that will take us into the next chapter.
A demonstration of the existence of anything presupposes that knowledge
pertains to existents rather than to essences ever-present and ready-made in our
minds. So, proving that something exists is really an expansion of the knowledge of
the existence of one thing to the knowledge of the existence of another on the basis
that there could not be the former, which we know to be, unless there were the
latter. If we deny the knowledge that the former does exist (as al1 idealism does
because for it knowledge of being is knowledge of essences, not of existents), we
cannot demonstrate that the latter exists; in which case we can, at best, have an
analysis whereby we can show that knowing the former involves knowing the latter
(that is, we can have a sequence of knowledges). Every demonstration, therefore, of
the existence of something must begin with the knowledge of the existence of
something else.
This is important for understanding t h e character of an existentialist
demonstration of God's existence. St. Thomas describes the proof in several of his
works always insisting on the same point.

I t is not necessary to assume the divine essence or quiddity as the middle term of the
demonstration. In pIace of the quiddity, an effect is taken as the middle term, as in
demonstrations quia [we shall see what this means presentlyj. It is hom such effects that the
meaning of the name God is taken. For al1 divine narnes are imposed either by removing the
effects of God from Hirn or by rdating God in sorne way t o His effeckm

W e must not therefore try to read the Five Ways as an atternpt to demonstrate a
this or a quiddity. To do so would arnount to regarding the Five Ways as a propter
quid rather than a quia kind of proof which is what the Five Ways are; it would
amount to trying to fit the Five Ways into the mold of a deduction which they are
not. fiopter quid (on account of which) is an a priori type of demonstration arguing

=SCG 1, 12,8. See also ST, 1, q. 2, a 1-2, and De Pot., q. VII, a 3.

from cause to effect, and quia (because) is a posteriori type of demonstration arguing
from effect to cause. W e often use because and on account of which interchangeably,.
but here we must make a distinction between these terms.
Since we are far more familiar with propter quid type of proof, I shall explain the
quia type. Quia proves a cause from an effect; it proves a cause which is prior in
nature to its effect and is posterior in Our knowledge from an effect which is
posterior in nature and prior in our knowledge. But how can an effect have priority
in our knowledge to a cause in our knowledge when a cause is prior in nature and its
effect posterior?
The first thing we must note is that an effect which is prior in our knowledge is
not prior in our knowledge as an effect, for if it were, it would be known as an effect
of a cause, but a cause is precisely what we are trying to prove. The priority of an
effect in Our knowledge over our knowledge of its cause is the priority of that which
is known before its cause is known and of that which is known as a given. This
means two things: the knowledge of a given is an effect of some existent thing or a
being which, as such, gives rise to knowledge, and the given is then proved t o be an
effect of some other existing thing.
Let us take as an example that a gopher is proved from a series of holes in the
ground. The holes in the ground are not known as a n effect of a gopher, for if they
were, there would no need t o prove a gopher; in that case we would know a gopher
without a proof. We know the holes in the ground as a given which is given by the
yard where the holes are. W e know that the yard is dug up because the yard is in
fact dug up. That is given in experience and we do not prove it (just as in the case of
contingent being we do not prove that it is contingent, that is given in experience;
what we demonstrate is the cause of contingent being). We prove that the holes in
the dug up yard, which we know without proof, corne from a gopher. I t does not
matter a t this point how we prove the cause because we are only interested in what
quia proof is; the how of the proof will interest us in the next chapter. To surn up, in
a quia proof we have knowledge of a given, and from that knowledge of a given we
also know that it would not be given to our knowledge unless some actual being, not
in our experience, were giving off what we receive as given (the data, literally things
that are given). Given these two things we are in the position to acquire knowledge
by way of proof that there is in fact that being giving off the data which is not in our
experience. Again, the how of the proof will be explained in the next chapter.
Having said this, we can already hear the mumurs from contemporary
philosophers saying that this is nothing more than a case of begging the question.
They will charge St. Thomas with question begging when he claims to have proved
the existence of a cause by arguing that if there is a caused being, there is a cause;
because if there were not the cause, there would not be a caused being. Now, if this
were a well placed charge, i t would reveal an uncharacteristically careless St.
Thomas. But he is not careless because he is not trying to prove that being is caused
(contingent) but the cause of some caused being (we need to see where precisely he
thinks a cause is called for). St. Thomas is not confusing a proof from causality with
a proof of causality. Causality is a natural induction from experience," which,
because it is experience of being (not essence-being) and the consequent knowledge
of being, allows us to formulate, without arguing for, al1 of the principles, from
which we may then argue? The first principles, being se!f-evidently true, are
neither proved nor provable, and in light of them the conclusions of the quia proof is
reached.

=Sec In Post. Analyt., II, lect. 20.

e IV Metaph, k t . 6, specially notes 605 and 606. Recall our discussion of causaiity in ch. VI,
m ~ e In
pp. 127-130. St. Thomas is not begging the question because he is not confusing a demonstration of a
causal proposition with a demonstration of causality; he is not invoking a prnciple of causality where
he should be offering a demonstration of X i s caused.
 This, 1think, escapes many a reader of the Five Ways influenced by the modem,
inteflectus-free philosophical tradition. The result is a number of commentaries on
the Five Ways concluding that either God's existence has not been demonstrated or
that something other than God's existence has been demonstrated.
A denial or a disregard of the first principles necessarily amounts to a denial of
the very possibility of an intellectual activity (of demonstrating) like that of the
Five Ways, namely, an activity of philosophizing about being as being, which is to
deny the legitimacy of scholastic existential metaphysics. But perhaps we do not
wish to deny the first principles but only assert, along with Kant, that existence is
merely a category of the mind (and not of the thing in itself) to which the first
principles do not actually apply. In the context of such a position there is no
perceivable difference between the exercised existence of each individual existent
and the existence that is part of the signification of a conceived being. In other
words, existence is not a real predicate, but is contained in the idea of an existent in
question, and consequently nothing is added to that idea by saying that conceived
~ ' to know anything is for most modern thinkers to know an
being e x i s t ~ .Thus

"'Consider the following argument against Kant. "The status of existing adds nothing to the
intelligible contours of what would and does exist if it exists. Yet the status of existing adds
something ... for, $100 are $100 whether they exist or not. In this Kant was dead right. So also the
process of acquiring $100 is a process of acquiring $100, whether you are acquiring $100 or not.
Nevertheless, the status of existing adds something to the $100 which you have: i t adds the status of
hauing $100, and as certainly that added feature is subtracted from the $100 which you do not have.
The sarne holds as between the actual process of acquiring $100 and the meaning of that process. In
this Kant was dead wrong. Anyone who ever had, or is acquiring, $100 knows the difference.... If you
Say that $100 can exist solely because they are $100, you have said that t o be a possible existent is to
be $100. Against the fact. There are many other possible existent5 besides $100. Hence to be 100
possible dollars is to be a subject of posse ['to be able'], not solely upon the score that $100 is $100,
but also because there is a cause (whose essence the possible $100 mimics) able to make $100 to be,
and there Les the complete posse of $100. In al1 cases of esse, whether accidental, specific, or the esse
of an existent as multiple existent, esse need not be given at all. But it can be given, because there are
subjects to which it can be given, because there are causes which c m give esse to these subjects, and
this makes al1 multiplicity possible." Gerard Smith, The Philosophy of Being,pp. 62 and 78-79. See
also chapter eight above.
essence. For St. Thomas nothing could be further from the truth. I have tried to
show in chapters five through nine why he thinks this. My effort is an attempt to get
us at least to stop trying to understand the Five Ways through modern conceptions
of being and the knowledge of being, which are in one way or another Platonic or
essentialist conceptions.
The difference between the essentialists and St. Thomas is irreconcilable. It is a
matter of the evidence of the difference between thinking that something 1F because
it is, which we see and feel (as 1 tned to show with examples in the first part of
chapter seven), and only thinking that something is. The opponents of St. Thomas
will not allow that we know, in the order of being, that something is because we see
and feel it, that because it is contingent (either in the order of motion, efficiency, or
existence) there must be a cause of its contingency, or else it would be necessary.
They will Say that these things are true in the order of knowledge, but that we
cannot know whether it is true in the order of being. St. Thomas cannotproue to his
opponents the truth of his position, but whatever evidence there is it is al1 on the
side of St. Thomas; and that evidence is the evidence of individual existents, the
evidence of the data they give off, which is the very stuff of our knowledge of being.
Finally, St. Thomas is not saying, in contradiction to Kant, that existence is
known in addition to an essence; we do not know fsh,fowl, man plus or minus their
existence. We first experience a sensible individual existent, and then we form
knowledge of it; we grasp its essence by conceptually abstracting it from sense data,
and its existence we either affirm or deny through judgment, not an argument. If the
judgment of existence is mediated by a middle term (which in t h e case of God is his
effect), it is a demonstrated existence. Let us now see how such a demonstration
must unfold.
 CHAPTER X

Causality and the Five Ways

g p u z z h g reflections in a mirrior. At present al[ know is a iittie fraction
At presmt aie are men i o ~ k n ut
of the h t h .
S t . Paul, The Erst Letter t o Corinth

W e have established that God's existence is not self-evident and must be proven
if it is to be known by the human mind scientifically, that is, through acausal
demonstration. We have also established that this proof cannot be a deduction or a
propter quid kind of proof in which the mind moves from a cause t o its effect, or, as
St. Thomas says, in which we argue from what is prior absolutely and not from what
is pnor relatively only to us. This is because we do not scientifically know zeihat God
is. For that reason we can formulate only a nominal definition of God rather than a
real definition (1 shall explain these terrns below), and our demonstration of his
existence must be a quia kind of proof. The object of the present chapter is to
provide the final stage of preparation for reading the Five Ways by showing how
God is defined as the middle term of a proof of his existence, and by showing how a
cause is proved from its effects in a quia kind of proof (the latter requires a more
detailed consideration of the Thomistic understanding of c a u ~ a l i t ~ ) . ~ ~

ST, 1, q. 2, a. 2. 1 am relying in this section on this part of Summa Theologica, on Arktotle's

PostenorAnalytics, 1, 13 and St. Thomas' commentary on that text, and on Maurice Holioway's,
Gerard Smith's, and Henry Renard's books on natural theology.
The Nominal Defition of God
A discussion of propter quid and quia kinds of proof that pertains to Our main
purpose can be found in Aristotle's Posterior Analytics Bk. 1, ch. 13, and in St.
Thomas' Cornrnentary on the Postenor Analytics of Aristotle, 1, lect. 23. In this
discussion we find an example that 1 think is very important for understanding the
nature of a n existentialist proof of God's existence with respect to the problem of
the middle term and how a quia proof proves.
In this text Aristotle points out that we can prove whether some planets are
relatively near to the Earth, if it can be shown that they do not twinkle. The point
to see is that "planets are not near because they do not twinkle, but, because, they
are near, they do not t ~ i n k l e . The
" ~ point may seem not be a point a t al1 because it
seems to be saying the same thing twice. It isn't. It is a point that expresses a
differencebetween "knowledge of the fact and knowledge of the reasoned fact."=
When we conclude that some planets are near to the Earth we do so on the basis
of two things: the knowledge that they d o not in fact twinkle (which is a knowledge
of the fact acquired by sense experience), and the knowledge that the not-twinkling
thing is near. St. Thomas explains how we acquire the latter, which is knowledge of
the reasoned fact, when he says "the fixed stars twinkle because in gazing at them
the sight is beclouded on account of [among other things] the distance,"% and
consequently the not-twinkling thing is not beclouded on account of as great a
distance as is the twinkling thing. What we do not know, however, is whether the
near and the not-twinkling are one and the sarne, or, to put it another way, whether

m ~ r i s t o t l e ,Posterior Analytics, 1, 13, 78a 38, in The Basic Works of Arktotle, ed. by Richard
McKeon, (New York: Randorn House, 1941). p. 129.
Ibid. One can be said to knoa a fact when he observes how things are in nature connected and
when he expresses this connection in specific t e m . Knowlcdge of the reasoned fact is acquired when
one explains that which one observes and the properties of things in terrns of intelligibIe relations to
the causes of the things.
3P5 Commentary on the PosteriorAnalytics of Aktotle, Book 1, lect. 23.
the nearness of the planets is the cause of their not-twinkling. If we knew that, we
would be able to muster a propter quid kind of proof and show that planets do not
twinkle on account of the fact that they are near. But as the matter stands, we are
able to know the not-twinkling, not as the cause of the nearness of planets, but as
the effect of sornething (a planet) which is near, and that very thing which is near is
the cause of not-twinkling (not necessarily the cause of nearness).
This is very important for a proper understanding of the philosophical character
of the Five Ways. Many modern interpreters read the Five Ways as if in them St.
Thomas were doing precisely the opposite of what he is doing, namely, to use our
analogy with planets, proving the cause of the nearness of the planets. This is why
people like Kenny conclude that this is al1 just outmoded cosmology and that we
can dernonstrate a different cause of the nearness of the planets with the aid of
modern science. In fact, the Five Ways, although making use of the cosmology of
their day, are nevertheless an instance of a different and higher science which we
examined in chapters three and five.
To sum up, in knowing that planets are near because we know that they do not
twinkle, we have only a reason, or the because (quia), why we know they are near,
we do not have the reason, or the that on account ofmhich (propter quid) the planets
are near. The latter requires hrther examination, the examination into the essence,
which in the case of God is not open to us. But once we have proved that planets are
near (or that God exists) because they do not twinkle (or because God is the proper
cause of the act of being of contingent existents), we may go on to see what it really
means to be near (or what God really is). But we cannot at present go on to such an
inquiry without finding out first whether something is really near (if God really
does ex&). But something, namely planets, reaily is near because we know by sense
experience that this very something does not twinkle, and we know, using our
intellects, that the not-twinkling is near. In the same way we know individual
contingent existents through sense experience (which gives rise t o our intuition of
their act of existing first), and then in light of the indemonstrable principle of
causality seen by the intellect demonstrate their dependence for existence on z
cause beyond them, or that they are in fact caused.
We can now understand better what St. Thomas means when he says,

When the existence of a cause is demonstrated from an effect, this effect takes the place of the
definition of the cause in proof of the cause's existence. This is especially the case in regard to
God, because, in order to prove the existence of anything, it is necessary t a accept as a middle
term the rneaning of the word, and not its essence, for the question of its essence fallows on the
question of its existence. Now the names given to God are derived from His effects;
consequently, in demonstrating the existence of God from His effects, we may take for the
rniddle term the rneaning of the word " ~ o d . " ~
Our nominal definition of God, or the middle term of our proof, will be what the
Theologian calls the meaning of the word God rather than that which signifies his
essence which we cannot at present know any more than we can know the cause of
the nearness of the planets ftom knowing only the not-twinkling. The middle term
of our proof of the planets is the not-minkling. It is the effect of something that is
near (planets) but also the cause of our knoming that this something is near. The
middle term of the quia proof, or the nominal definition, is not a real definition
because we are not assuming that the not tceiinkling is the cause of the near (we are
taking it only as the cause of our knomledge of the near, but this knowledge is of an
existent, not of an essence, as in essentialism). If we were so assuming the term, we
would not be proving a cause from its effect, but an effect from its cause; we would
not have a quia proof, but apropter quid proof or an ontological proof.
It would not be profitable here to get stuck on seeking an etymological meaning
of "God." This, aithough of interest to philologists, will not help us in understanding
the Five Ways. A nominal definition in this case means a definition of "the meaning
of the word God", that is, a definition to which a word is related as a sign is related
to that which it signifies. In our example of the planets the meaning of the near is the
not-trennkling the latter is the nominal definition of the former, that is, the former
describes the latter to which it is related as a sign is related to that which it signifies.
But here is the important point: this relation between the sign and what it signifies
is real, not nominal, it is real because the near does not in fact twinkle (just as an
individual existent does in fact exercise its contingent act of existing)? The not-
treinkling is an effect of the near (which of course has to be shown, as it has to be
shown that the act of existing of individual existents is an effect of that which al1
men cal1 God [not that which is God], and that is why we have astronomy and
natural theology), but whether God is in fact his own act of existing is a question for
h r t h e r consideration, a question we can raise only after we have established the
existence of that which may or may not be existence itself (Ipsum esse). In other
words, we are inserting a necessary step that must corne before any essentialist kind
of thinking about God can begin; before St. Anselm's kind of proof can begin to be
formulated, that is, before we can talk about the connection between God's essence
and existence.
Now this gives us the license for a nominal definition of God as the cause of the
ed&ence ofthings which is the middle term of the quia proof of God's existence. But
we have not thereby proven that God does in fact cause the existence of things.
That is the work of the Five Ways. We have only established the name of that the
existence of which we shall demonstrate. Furthermore, it is not that God exists
because things exist, it is the other way round: things exist because God causes them
to exist. The important point is that we knom the cause of the existence of things
(God) exists because we have demonstrated by proof that the cause of the existence

This, of course, will not be acceptable to idealism and essentialism. The relation will only be
regarded as real within Aristotelian and Thomistic metaphysics and epistemology. We must choose
how we shall begin thinking about the reai!
of things (God) causes things to exist; but God causing things to exist is not the
cause of his existence (if it were we would demonstrate his existence by way of
propter quid kind of proof), it is, rather, the cause of our knowledge of his existence.
We can form, then, the following syllogism: God ( 2 ) is the cause of the existence
of some existent (Y); the cause of the existence of some existent (Y) does exist (X),
therefore God ( 2 ) exists (X), or Z is X. The first premise is the nominal definition of
God serving as the middle term of our quia proof. The second premise must be
demonstrated. But when it is demonstrated, we are not yet in the position to say
God exists (any more than Geach and Copleston are in the position to conclude
from their interpretation of the premises about the cause of change and efficiency to
the existence of that cause); we are only in the position to Say that God is the cause
of the existence of some existent.
We rnust see the reason for this! The proof of God's existence in our syllogism
above is where we Say that God is the cause and that the cause does in fact exist. To
understand the relationship between the cause and the existence of cause properly
we must take a closer look at causality as St. Thomas understands it. It is precisely
the understanding of the properly Thomistic notion of causality that is missing in so
many modern and contemporary interpretations of the Five Ways. The importance
of this cannot be over stressed! 1am emphasizing the word properly because of the
following text in the Summa where the Theologian speaks of propercause.

When an effect is better known to us than its cause, from the effect we proceed to the knowledge
of the cause. And from every effect the existence of its proper cause can be demonstrated, so long
as its effects are better known to us; because since e u e y effect depends upon its cause, if the
effect exists, the cause must pre-exist. Hence the existence of God, insofar as i t is not self-
evident to us, can be demonstrated frorn those of his effects which are known to us.=

Let us ask here a question of enormous importance. When St. Thomas says that
Godls existence "can be demonstrated from those of his effects which are known to

- - - - -- --

1, q. 2, a. 2. (italic and bold emphases mine) See d s o SCG, II, 16,4.

us," what aspect of God's effects will help us reach the existence of God? Their
motion? Their causal activity? The subatomic structure of their particles? These,
understood to perfection, can never yield the existence of anything. Furthemore,
when t hese t hings are studied scientifically, they are always encountered in
individual existents which are the true data of Our knowledge. St. Thomas gives the
answer to our question when he says "if the effect exists, the cause must pre-exist."
It is therefore the existence of effects that yields the knowledge of the existence of
their cause. Thus, in the Five Ways, we must see the Theologian arguing for the
existence of the cause of the existence of things (God) through the act of existing of
some effect of that cause encountered by us more easily as moving, causing, and so
on. A good preparation for the reading of the Five Ways must, then, include an
answer to this question: what does St. Thomas mean by proper causality? Is his
understanding of it different from Aristotle's? We can be certain that it is different
from Hume's and from much of the modern and contemporary understanding of
causality. It is also certain that if we abandon the notion of cause entirely, as much
of the modern philosophical tradition has done, we shall not be able to see why St.
Thomas thinks the Five Ways prove God's existence.
But one more point regarding the nominal definition of God as the middle term
of the quia proof must be established and clarified before we turn to causality. We
seem to be contradicting ourselves. On the one hand, we are saying that the middle
term in the quia proof of God's existence is the cause of the existence of things. But
on the other hand, in the quia proof the middle term is not a cause (as in the propter
quid proof) but an effect substituted for the real definition of the cause. How can
the middle term be both a cause and effect? That is, how can the cause of the
existence ofthings (God) as an effect substituted for the real definition of the cause
(as the middle term), be the effect of the cause we are trying t o prove (the effect of
God's causality)? Should it not be the very cause? The philosophical children of
Hume are by now certainly convinced that al1 this scholastic talk of causality "can
contain nothing but sophistry and illusion."
Causing is an activity, and an activity is understood by St. Thomas as either
immanent or transitive. Immanent activity is an "activity which has its principle
and term within the agent and which is a perfection of the agent itself, not of an
external patient?' Transitive action is an action that is not a perfection of the
agent but an action that perfects something external t o the agent, as for example the
action by which a hand moves a stick, or the action by which Beethoven plays his
Moonlight sonata. We are therefore interested in God's causal action which is
somehow transitive. The reason why we are not interested here in the immanent
action of God should be clear by now: such an action is not an effect of God and can
be used only in a propter quid kind of proof which requires the knowledge of the
nature or essence of the cause whose effect we are demonstrating, and we do not yet
have any knowledge of God's essence. But we are also interested in a relevant
character of a potency actualised by causal activity. Again following Aristotle, St.
Thomas maintains that some potencies (those that generate something else, such as
the act of building which in addition to that act also produces a building) have their
act in the thing which they produce, as the act of building is in the thing that is
built?' The full impact of this fact is utilised by St. Thomas in analyzing the
relationship between God and his creatures where causal activity of God (his
transitive action) is the effect as related to its cause. Consider the following text.
Creation is not a change, but the very dependency of the created act of being [esse] upon the
principle from which it is produced. And thus, creation is a kind of relation ... Nevertheless,
creation appears to be a kind of change from the point of view of Our understanding only,
namely, in that our intellect grasps one and the same thing as not existing before and as existing
aftenvards. But, clearly, if creation is some sort of relation, then it is a certain reality; and neither
is it uncrezted nor is it created by another relation. For, since a created effect depends really
upon its creator, a relation of real dependency, such as this, must itself be something real. But

~ i c t i o n a nojf Scholdc Philosophy, p. 5. See also In IX Metaph. k t . 8, n. 1865.

'* ~ e Aristotle's
e Metaphysics, Bk. IX, ch.. 8, 1050a 24 ff., and In IX Metaph. lect. 8, n. 1864.
 everything real is brought into being by God [if there is one]; it therefore owes its being to
G O ~ . ~ O ~

In other words, because God's action by which he causes the existence of things is in
the effects of that causal action (it is in their contingency, in them as their
dependence of a contingent existent on that which gives it existence), that causal
action is something real, a real thing "not created by another relation". And this is
what it means to Say that the cause of the existence of things is an effect in the
middle term of the quia proof. In another place the Theologian calls it "passive
creation" which is in the creature and is the creature?
Now if the cause of the existence of things is taken to mean God as he is in
himself, it cannot serve as the middle term of the quia proof. But if it is taken to
mean things in their dependence on God (which is what it is to Say that they are
effects of God's causal action), then it is the meaning of the middle term and the
cause of our knowledge that God is the cause of things. But we seem to be trying to
do the impossible: to identify in some way a cause with its effect. And yet we have
two options before us. We can either abandon the possibility of scientific
knowledge-knowledge through the causes-and opt for complete unintelligibility
of effects, of contingent being as contingent and therefore as an effect. Our other
option is to settle for a partially intelligible (and partially unintelligible)
explanation of effects explained through their causes? This option is the subject
matter of the next section.

"' SCG II, 18,2-4. See also, De Pot., q. III, a. 5.

IrnseeST, 1, q. 45, a. 3, ad 2.
"The scholastic notion of efficient causality is, therefore, not without difficulties. But we need not
on that score pronounce it absurd. In fact, there does not seem to be much of an argument for
rejecting it except that we do not fully understand it. But there does seem to be too much evidence in
the world to reject it. John Wild argues this way: "Causal efficacy is a relational concept. What it
means is the diffusion of something from one being (the cause) to ariother which is able to receive it
(the effect). To the atomic analyst such relational potencies and powers [active and passive
potencies] are sheer nonsense. Reality is made up of perfectly actuai atomic capsules which are
entirely insular and self-enclosed. Nature however is constantly confronting us wit4 evidence of
Causality Considered Further
Philosophicai inquiries into causes begin with an attempt to understand change.
But change is only intelligible if we possess intellectus; if we do not along with Hume
deny the human mind the faculty of conceiving (and insist that it is capable only of
perceiving), nor if along with Descartes we understand human intellectual activity
as starting out with purely mathematical truths and innate ideas, and then cal1 God
to help us establish the tmths in the sensible realrn. Change will be intelligible
through causality only if we inquire into the knowable, that is, being, as we have
seen Aristotle do in the first section of chapter nine. W e must now Say a bit more
about this inquiry in the context of causality.
According to Aristotle, to experience change is to experience simultaneously
both continuity and discontinuity. To make this dichotomy intelligible he
introduces his understanding of causality. Let us take as an example again a green
tomato becoming red. W e have a new thing (a red tomato) coming from an old
thing (a green tomato). In noticing this we must not make the mistake Heraclitus
made when he concluded from this a discontinuity between a green and a red
tomato; he maintained that it is not the same tomato which was both green and then
red. We must, as our experience tells us, see the continuity; we must see that it is
the same tomato that is now green and then red. On the other hand we must not
deny the same share in reality to both the green and the red tomato; we must not go
against our experience which tells us that green tomato is not identically red
tomato. Now the only way to make sense of both the continuity and discontinuity of

causal efficacy. The coIourless gases O and H act on one another in certain ways to bring into
existence a new hsed substance quite distinct from any mere juxtaposition of O and W.Stones break
windows, and murderers slit their victim's throats. No one who really disbelieved in causal efficacy
would ever read a detective story." ("Realistic Defence of Causal Efficacy," Review of Metaphysics, 2
uune, 1949), pp. 6-7). See also Paul Weiss, Modes of Being (Carbondale, Ill.: Southern Illinois
University Press, 1958), p. 40: "To deny causation is thus to deny current evidence, to ignore an
ornnipresent category, to be faced with an inexplicable world, and to have an inexplicable belief that
it is a mistake to Say there is a causation in fact."
a changing thing is to see that the green tornato becomes red in virtue of something
which is in some way red, or which possesses within itself redness (whatever redness
may be; we shall Ieave that question to physicists, chemists, and biologists), and
communicates redness to the tomato. W e know this to be sunlight. (A light other
than that of the Sun can also d o the job of communicating redness, but let us
suppose that the tomato in our example is a tasty one). Therefore, the sunlight
which communicates redness to the tomato is a cause of the tomato becoming red.
Let us surn this up in the context of Aristotle's famous maxim that "every thing
in motion is necessarily being moved by sorne [other] thing."" Only one possible
scenario can make this claim false. Either that which appears to be changing (the
tomato) is not really changing, or it is. If it is not really changing, then the subject of
change is identical with the determination (in Our example, the tomato is identical
with its redness), and in that case not every thing is moved by another. But if the
subject of change is really changing, then it is not one and the same with the
determination brought by change, then the subject of change is not responsible for
the change that accrues to it. The green tomato does not by itself become red, and
given that it does in fact become red, it must so become by an activity of another,
namely, sunlight. In other words, we cannot both admit that there is change and
deny the cause of change. Essentialists deny that the real, or being, resides in the
realm of change and thereby pronounce change unreal or illusory. But that, at least,
is consistent with their position. Many modern philosophers admit change but at
the same time deny the reality of causes. Aristotle and St. Thomas insist that change
must be made intelligible, and it can only be so made in terms of a cause outside the
subject of change.

AArLstotle's Physics, (tram. by H.G. A p o d e ) , Bk. VII, 1,241b 24.

 In the same way limited acts or achievements cannot be made intelligible
without the necessary condition of causality. What are limited acts? St. Thomas
says that "it is the business of an agent limited to some determinate species to
produce its effect from pre-existing matter by bestowing a form upon it in any
manner w h a t s ~ e v e r . This
" ~ ~ daim and the text from which it comes is important for
good scholastic understanding of causality. We can take note in it of the character
of limited act. As act it is any actuality that is achieved and is no longer in the state
of being achieved (it is not a potency, for if it were, we would still be talking about
change, the green tomato would still exist as becoming red and not as limited act,
not as a tomato being or existing as red); as Iimited it is an act of an agent that is
determined by some species, that is, it is not an act of something that is everything
being can be. Our example will shed light on this. The tomato existing as a plant (of
the species Lycopersicon esculentum) is a limited act because its being a plant is not
al1 being can be; being can also be a non-tomato plant, and there are beings other
than plants.
Aristotle's maxim applies and can be tested in the case of timited acts as well. Let
us ask if it is possible to posit a limited act like the tomato's being a plant without
positing the cause of that act. To do so amounts to making a sort of identification we
encountered in the case of change. If the tomato's limited act of being (existing as) a
plant has no cause, then there is no reason outside this particular tomato for its
existence; it is identical with existing, and its act is not limited. But that is against
the facts, because there is also Felix the cat, Fido the dog, my neighbour Bill, etc. It
is impossible, therefore, that to exist is to be this tomato; it is impossible in the case
of a limited act of existing to identih the subject of existing with the act of existing,
impossible because no other existent could exist, and Our tomato could not not exist,

"SCG II, 16.3.

which are two insurrnountable difficulties opposing such an identification. W e
must, therefore, posit a cause of both change and limited act, if they are to be
intelligible to us.4m
This, roughly, is how the need for intelligibility through causality in the realm of
contingent being arises; a need which, unless it is fulfilled will leave change and
limited being completely unintelligible. However, this intelligibility of change and
limited acts through causality is less than complete. Seeing that it is requires an
insight, and 1 have not been able to find a better expression of it than in one of
Gerard Smith's works where he illustrates it with an example. We have already
hinted at this difficulty when, in formulating a nominal definition of God a t the end
of the last section, we saw the curious identification of cause and effect.

Assume that a germ is the cause of a given disease. Three problems are thereby solved: (1) The
problem why there is a disease rather than not is solved, since the efficient cause, the germ, is
such a reason; (2) The problem why the efficient cause "ups and causes" rather than not is solved,
because the final cause, which is the disease-to-be, determines the efficient cause to act rather
than not to act; (3) The problem why the disease is of this sort and not of another sort is solved,
since in the efficient cause is preinscribed the intelligible contours of the effect ... [ d l these] are
explained by efficient, final, and exemplary causality respectively. There is lacking to such an
explanation of an effect only the complete intelligibiIity of the effect in itself. In itself an effect is
only partially intelligible, precisely because its explanation lies partly outside itself, narnely, in
its cause.
We are thus confronted with the intelligible mystery of causality: cause and effect must be one,
eIse there is no explanation of change [the light must be in the tomato making i t red] and
achievement [the cause of the tomato's existence must be in the tornato]; cause and effect must
be different, else there is no effect and therefore nothing to explain [the identification of the
subject of change with the change accruing to it and the agent with its limited act of being
nuIlifies the need to explain change and contingency because it nullifies change and contingency
which our experience tells us is there]nm

Thus the real problem of causality, the problem that scholastic philosophers are well
aware of and are not trying to shroud in sophistry and illusory solutions is the
following. Change reveals a composite of t h e subject of change and the
determination of change; limited acts also reveal a composite of their act and the

"Oj~hisclearly points out that change cannot be made intelligible if we identiS being with essence.
Essentialism for that reason allows for intelligibility only in the realm where there is neither change
nor individuai existent..
" Gerard Smith, Nutural Theology, p. 80.
reason for their act. The unity of the composite in each case is explained by a cause
that is both separate from and united with the composite. The disunion of the cause
from its effect in the case of both change and limited act consists in the fact that the
change and the reason for the act arefrom the cause; the union consists in the fact
that the change and the reason for the act are in the subject of change and in the
agent whose act is being explained."
We must now finally Say something about what St. Thomas means by proper
cause. He defines cause as "that from whose existing another f o l l o ~ s . "Henri
~
Renard restates St. Thomas' definition by saying that "a cause is a principle having a
direct influx on the t o be of another, and this definition is true of al1 four types of
causes."410The Thomistic notion of cause will, therefore, reflect the Thomistic
notion of t o be which, as we have seen, is not the notion of essence, as in Plato, nor is
it the notion of substantial form, as in Aristotle, but of existence. In this context we
must understand the Theologian's commentary on the following text of Aristotle
which points to the mystery of causality.

Causes which are in actuality and are taken as individuals exist, or do not exist, at the same time
as the things of which they are the causes, for example, as in the case of this doctor who is heding
and this man who is being heated, and this builder who is building and that building which is
being built.""
If this is how the matter stands with the relationship between causes and effects,
and if God is the cause of the existence of things, does God then cease to exist when
his effects cease to exist? No. The middle term of the proof is not a real definition,
we do not know what God is nor do we prove what he is when we prove that he is.
We are simply saying that God's causal power ceases to cause (not that it ceases to

4m
For Aristotie's account of this see his Ph~sics,Bk. III, the entire ch. 3; Metaphysics, II, 2. For St.
Thomas' account see De Ver., q. II, a. 10; SCG,II, 16; ST, 1-11, q. 1,a. 4.
'@St. Thomas Aquinas, The Principles of Nature, ed. cit., p. 17 (italics mine)
410
Henri Renard, The Philosophy of God, (Milwaukee: The Bruce PubIishing Company, 1951). p. 19.
4 1 ' ~ ~ o t l Physics,
e's B k II, ch. 3.195b 17.
exist) the being of its effects, when the being of the effects ceases. Let us consider St.
Thomas' commentary on the Philosopher's text we just read.

Causes in act and causes in potency differ as follows. Causes operating in act exist and do not
exist simultaneously with those things of which they are the cause in act. For example, if we take
singular causes, i-e., proper causes, then this healer exists and does not exist simultaneously with
him who becomes healed, and this builder exists simultaneously with that which is built ... so
also the divine agent, which is the cause of existing in act, is simultaneous with the existence of
the thing in act. Hence if the divine action were removed from things, things would fd1 into
nothingness, just as when the presence of the sun is removed, light ceases to be in the air."I2

A proper cause in the realm of contingent being, therefore, is that upon which a
contingent existent is dependent for its act of existing; the existence of a contingent
being is continually being caused by an agent outside of it. We do not know this
from a scientific analogy, and it would be foolish to look to the Five Ways for such
an analogy. We know this from the indemonstrable and self-evident principle of
causality, and from the definition of cause which we derive from the data of sense
experience and the work of making the data intelligible by agent intellect.
What then does it rnean to demonstrate that a cause emsts? It does not mean to
show an analytic dependence of a being that can not be, of a being that exists on
borrowed existence, on the cause of that existence. That is to show what it is to have
a cause; it is not to prove the existence of that cause. As St. Thomas puts it, "the
reason why a cause is required is not rnerely because the effect is not necessary, but
because the effect might not 6 e if the cause were not."13 This is what we need to
look for in the Five Ways: why would the effect in question considered in each of
the Ways not be (exist) if its cause did not exist; what is St. Thomas' argument for
that claim? The interpretations offered by Copleston and Geach and by a host of
contemporary cosmological readings of the Five Ways do not touch the core of this
question, and for that very reason fail to show us why St. Thomas thinks he has
answered it.

'12 Commentary on Aristotle's Physics, Bk. II, ch. 3, lect 6, n. 195.

1, q. 44, a. 1, ad 2. (italics mine)
 The circular intellection which we mentioned in the previous chapter does not
amount to giving us a proof by stating and restating the principle of causality. That
would be no proof to an existentialist! It is not because individual existents are
contingent that a cause of them is required; they are not caused because they are
contingent. Such a proof would be an essentialist proof, like the proofs from a
necessary or a perfect being of St. Anselm and Descartes. Although the first premise
would not be of God but of creature, it would still be a premise of something other
than of existence of a being, and as such it could not tead to the existence of another
being. A cause of contingent being is needed because they exist; and they would not
exist unless they were caused to exist by a cause that exists.
Though the relation to its cause is not part of the defznition of a thing caused [of a contingent
being], nevertheless it [the relation to its cause] follows from what is bound up in a being by
participation*; because from the fact that a thing is**being by participation [not because it is a
contingent being], it follows that it is caused. Hence, such a being cannot be without being caused
[not that it cannot be contingent] ... But, since t o be caused does not enter into the essence of
being as such, therefore it is possible for us to find a being uncaused [whose essence we do not
know]
A proof, therefore, is knowledge that the cause, to which testifies the existence of a
contingent being and the intellect's inference that a contingent being would not be
unless it were caused to be, is the cause of the contingent existence revealed by an
existent itself. In other words, it is not enough to Say that contingent being is caused
t o exist because it is contingent, and that therefore its cause must exist; the
existence of God as the cause of the existence of things is proved when it is shown
that only a cause of existence explains the existence of a contingent existent.

4 1 4 ~ 1, , 44, a 1, ad 1. *I have replaced the rendering of the standard translation of tamen sequitur
~ q.
ad ea quae sunt de ejus ratione (still it follows, as a consequence, on what belongs t o its essence) with
t h e rendering of the BIackfriars edition because ejus refers to entis which for St. Thomas is not
essence, and consequently the expression de ejus ratione must be translated simply as being; **also, est
enr should be translated is being, not has being which confims that St. Thomas is not saying that
essence is the reason why a being must be caused. See also the foIIowing texts where St. Thomas
makes the same point: De Pot., q. III, a. 1,ad 17;q. III, a. 5, ad 2; De Vw.,q. IV, a. 6,Resp. and ad 3.
P m Se and Per A c c i d m Causes
Before we finally take a look a t the Five Ways themselves, we ought to consider
a few more points pertaining to causality. What is called a proper cause has as its
corollary a secondary cause, and proper and secondary causes are known as per se
and per accidem causes. We must now look at these more closely, as well as the
instrumental cause, and the series of perse and per accidms causes. Our inquiry into
al1 these "causes" is really an inquiry into the principle of causality, that is, we want
to see manifestations of the need to make being as becorning (changing) intelligible.
It is not an inquiry into this or that thing, that is, the descriptions of al1 these
"causes" are not the descriptions of individual existents but of a single principle
applied to different aspects of the need to make change intelligible.
Any talk of causality, then, is closely tied up with change. In trying to
understand proper or per se causality, let us go once more to Our example of the
green tomato becoming red. Under Parmenidian, essentialist understanding of being
the tomato is not becoming red, there is no such thing as a changing tomato, nor is
there such thing as change because being is and non being is not, and there can be
nothing between being and non-being. Aristotle says there is change, but he does
not go along with Heraclitus in maintaining that being is change because change is
only possible if there is that mhich changes; the notion of pure change is
unintelligible. Let us ask, why does the green tomato become red? The answer
cannot be, the tomato became red from nothing, because nothing yields nothing.
Nor can the answer be, the red tomato is the green tomato, because clearly the
tomato came into existence as red aker it existed as green, and if it already did exist,
it could not corne to exist. The only answer is that in the tomato there is something
which is not red, and which is not nothing; this is what Aristotle and his medieval
interpreters cal1 primary or passive potency, which in our example is green tomato
able to be red.'"" This ability or potency of the green tomato to be red must not be
understood neither as being in some way red, for it is not red at all, nor as a
complete negation of the red tomato, in the sense that it both is not and is not able
to be red. The only way that a green tomato becomes a red tornato is because green
tornato is able to be red.
This is passive or primary potency and it is accompanied with active potency
also known as efficient causality. We must make clear this communion of the two
potencies. It is clear that passive potency, green tornato able to be red, is not by itself
able to bring about movement (make the change) in the tomato of going from green
to red. To be able to be in some way is not to be in that way. We must account for
this additional difference. It is clear that Our green tomato will not be caused to
become red unless it is able to be so caused. But neither wiIl it become so caused if it
is only able to be caused and is not actually caused to become red. Again, that which
will actually cause the tomato to become red cannot be the tomato itself (that
would deny change), nor can it be nothing because nothing yields nothing. I t must,
therefore, be a something which accounts for the additional difference, namely that
which is that addition. It must be the "some thing" Aristotle mentions in his axiom
"every thing in motion is necessarily being moved by some thing." In our example of
the tomato, this is the sunlight. Technically the sun is in this sense called active
potency which reveals to us the notion of the proper or per se causality-a notion
that deepens our understanding of the principle of causality.
This "some thing," which accounts for the difference between a thing's ability to
be caused to becorne in some way and actually being so caused, and which is that
additional difference, cannot be such an explanation nor that difference unless it be

"'Se= Aristotle Physics, Bk. 1. ch. 2; Metaphysics Bk. V,ch. 12. See also St. Thomas' Commentanj on
AristotZe's Physics, Bk. III, lectures 2-5.
predisposed to act precisely so as to bring about the v e y effect that it does bring
about rather than some other effect. In other words, the effect is of the kind that it is
because the action that brought it about is of the same kind. For example, the
redness in Our tomato is redness rather than blueness because the action of the light
which caused the redness is the action of reddening the tomato. The nature of the
action reflects the nature of the effect. This characteristic of proper or per se
causality is a subprinciple and is called the principle of proper causality: omne agens
agit si& simile, every agent p roduces its like.
Another characteristic of proper causality brings to light a principle we have
already encountered in chapter six: omne agens agit propterfinern, every agent acts
on account of an end. It is the principle of finality. The central point is this: the
"some thing," or the efficient cause would not rise up and do the action it does,
unless it were predisposed to rise up and act. In other words, there would be no
action unless the agent were predisposed to act before it does in the way that it
does, unless it had an end, goal, or purpose (not necessarily a conscious or
premeditated purpose) which it set out to achieve. A purposeless action cannot exist
any more than a thing of no kind can exist.
We may illustrate both principles of per se causality with our example. Why do
we have a red tomato rather than ketchup? The reason is that the work of sunlight
is involved rather than the work of a cook. The kind that the effect will be and the
essentid characteristic of the agent's action is determined by the kind or nature of
the agent. If we ask, why is there a red tomato rather than no tomato, we must
answer that an existential predisposition to communicate redness rather than not to
communicate it explains why there is a red tomato. Thus a twofold predisposition of
a proper cause explains: first, why the effect and the causal action that brings it
about are the kind that they are (every agent produces its like, for it cannot bring
about what it does not have to give), and second, why the effect exists rather than
not (every agent acts or is predisposed to act to bnng about the effect). The latter is
obviously more important both in the order of being and knowledge. This brings out
rnost clearly the existential character of causality as it is understood by St. Thomas.
For Aristotle the substantial form is responsible for both predispositions of a proper
cause.
Accidental causality, on the other hand, can be seen in contradistinction to
proper causality, a contradistinction required by the fact that change occurs in more
ways than we mentioned in discussing proper causality. A per accidens cause differs
from a per se cause in that it is either not like an effect, or not predisposed to act
rather than not to act. In other words, a per accidm cause lacks either a principle of
proper causality or a principle of finality.
To illustrate the work of an accidental cause to which the principle of proper
causality does not apply, let us suppose that our reddening tomato has on it some
dew drops that are being dried up by the Sun which is also a t the same time
reddening the tornato. The reason why the dew drops are being dried up is not
because the sun is communicating redness. The sun's characteristic of
communicating redness merely happens to be conjoined with the causal
characteristic of drying up the dew drops. (Biologists, physicists, and chemists will
explain this conjunction better than 1can.) The perse cause of the dew drops being
dried is properly the sun-as-hot; the per accidem cause of the dew drops being dried
is the sun-as-communicating-redness.
The difference between accidental causes and their effects can also be seen in
situations where they are not conjoined to per se causes but are conjoined to per se
effects. For example, the gardener may, when he goes to work on his tomatoes, put
on sunglasses because he finds the Sun too bright. The sun is the per se cause of the
per se effect, which is the gardener squinting his eyes. To this per se effect is joined
another effect, namely, the putting on of sunglasses, which is an accidental effect.
The sun is the accidental cause of the accidental effect of the gardener putting on
sunglasses.
A change taking place through an accidental cause t o which cannot be
attributed the principle of finality must also be pointed out. Let Our gardener find a
srnail ruby as he digs out the weeds around the tomato plants. He did not dig in
order that he may find the gem; finding the gem does not account for his digging
because his digging can be completely accounted for without any reference to
finding the ruby, that is, he was not predisposed to finding the ruby. Thus a lack of
intention or the principle of finality in a causal activity makes that activity
accidental rather than proper or per se.
Next, we must make clear the meaning of an instrumental cause in preparing for
a profitable reading of the Five Ways. Again, in doing so we are simply saying more
about the principle of causality which makes change intelligible. Instrumental cause
may be defined this way: "a tool serving as a subordinate cause [rather than a
principal cause]; a cause without initiative in the start of action, but applied and
directed as a help to its efforts and purpose by a principal agent, and influencing the
product chiefly according to the form and intention of the prin~ipal."~'~
For example
a gardener's spade determines the essence of the gardener's action (digging rather
than pruning) by the kind of instrument that it is. This determining kind of an
instrument is its power. But an instrument's power is not by itself sufficient to bring
about the complete essence of an action. What is lacking is the application of the
instrument to its activity. The application of the instrument, as we saw in the above
definition, is owed to another cause called the principal cause. Thus, a spade which
will dig (due to its power), will not dig this or that garden, unless the gardener is

61' ~ictionanjofScholastic Philosophy, p. 19.See also St. Thomas' SCG, I I , 21.

the principal cause of the action of digging. Instrumental causality consists,
therefore, in two factors: the instrument's power, and the principle agent's power.
The instrument explains the essence of an action, but it does not explain why an
action takes place rather than not; it does not explain the existence of an action. It is
the principal cause alone that determines the existence of action because in it both
principles of per se causality are present?' This may puzzle someone like Anthony
Kenny who finds it nonsensical "that when you have explained a particular motion
at a particular time you have to explain also the occurrence of that motion." I t is
clear that by "explain" Kenny means explaining the kind that a motion is, that is,
accounting for the instrument's power and the principle agent's power. The
principle agent's power and intention wiil explain both why this or that particular
job the instrument is actually doing, AND the actual doing of that particular job.
These are not identical! The principal agent's power explains the former, his
intention to exercise that power rather than not to exercise it, explains the latter.
Kenny overlooks, or takes for granted, the existence of the effect, which makes al1 his
scientific explanations of it incomplete. But the principle of finality is very much a
part of the principle of causality, as has been shown in chapter six. A denial of both
or either is a denial of the principle of nonc~ntradiction?~

71'"An instrument performs its instrumental activity inasmuch as it is moved by the principal agent
and through this motion shares in some way in the power of the principal agent, but not so that that
power has its complete existence in the instrument, because motion is an incomplete act." De Ver., q.
XXVI, a. 1, ad 8. ed. cit.
The disappearance of final causality in modern philosophy is largely due to Descartes' denial of
substantial forms, to its identification with God's purposes by Robert Boyle, and to modern
ignorance of the scholastic philosophy which is more ignored than effectively criticised. St. Thomas'
position is summed up in the following text: "There is this difference between the efficient and the
final cause: the efficient is investigated as the cause of the process of generation and corruption
[becoming], but the final is investigated as also the cause of being ... for inasmuch as the thing is
directed to its goal by means of its forrn, it is aIso a cause of being...Now the Philosopher is speaking
of natural substances. Hence his statement must be understood to apply only t o a naturai agent,
which acts by means of motioc. For the Divine agent, who communicates being without motion, is
the cause not oniy of becoming but also of being." But modern philosophy is largely not a philosophy
of being as being, and so final causes are in i t poorly understood. In VII Metaph. lec. 17,n. 1660-1661.
 We should point out that the power of the principal cause in t h e instrument
responsible for the actual doing of a particular job cannot remain in the instrument
permanently; if it did the instrument would no longer be an instrument but the
principal agent. A spade would become a digger."' This is an important point
because it further clarifies the point that the instrumental and the principal cause
are not identical. I t is true that they are both efficient (a robot, for example, may be
as efficient as a human being), but they are efficient in different ways. The action of
efficient principal causes cornes from a power that is its own, whereas the action of
an instrumental efficient cause cornes from a power it has received (passively) from
another and it must continue to receive it while it is performing its action. The
efficient principal cause acts on another through the power of which it is its own
source.
A very important question arises at this point. If principal causes are their own
source of causal power, what need is there to posit God as the First Cause? St.
Thomas' answer escapes most critics of the Five Ways?'As we shall see, the answer
lies in the fact that even though the causal power of principal causes is their own,
they are not identically that power. They receive that power, and when they do, it
becomes their own (as a man's knowtedge becomes his own when he acquires it-a
soul, says Aristotle, is "in a way al1 things", not only that it hm al1 things), in a way
that the passively received power of instrumental causes does not become their own
but is rernoved from them as soon as the principal causes remove it, that is, as soon

"'It is true that the modern man is continually atternpting to make a digger out of a spade with his
cornputerised robots, but he has so far succeeded in making only a very sophisticated spade that still
needs the activity of its engineers to keep it running.
4x1Recall a typical conternporary criticisrn of the Five Ways: "the conternporary exponent of the

[Thomistic] argument probably should concede that this traditional defense of 5 is unsuccessful-
that indeed each contingent thing exists because of the causal activity of other contingent things in
the universe." Michal Peterson, et al., Reason and Religious Belief, p. 79.
as the principal causes stop causing through them. This gives us a very focused
direction for understanding the Five Ways.
The final stage of preparing the groundwork of the Five Ways involves a
discussion of per se and per accidens series of causes. To Say that causes are in a
series is to Say, first of all, that they are in some order related to one another and to
their common effect. An order in any series of causes may be proper or accidental."'
In a proper order al1 the causes are per se causes: the principles of proper causality
(which may be called its essential determinant) and finality (its existential
determinant) apply to them. In other words, they possess and retain the possession
(either as principal or instrumental causes) of the essence and existence of their
causal action both during the exercise of that action and after its exercise. In
accidental order of causes, the causes d o not possess both the essential and
existential determinants of their causal actions. We must now explain both these
orders in more detail. We can do this simply by thinking a little deeper about what
we have said so far about per se and per accidens causes.
Given the two chief characteristics of a per se cause, and therefore of a per se
series of causes, al1 the causes in that series must be engaged in the action of causing
their effect at the same time. It is a series of equal causes, which is to Say that they
al1 do what each one of them does, namely determine by the nature of their action
and the nature of the agent as a whole, the kind the effect will bel and by the
actually present causal activity determine the actuality of the effect.
However, not every cause in a per se series of causes determines the nature of
causal action in the same way. The reason wliy there is a series of causes rather than
only one cause is that many causes are needed to produce the effect. Even though, as

"' Henri Renard calls the proper order existential order because the principle of proper causality in
St. Thomas' philosophy is the principle of existentid causdity: "in the order of existence, every effect
depends upon its existential cause here and now." Renard, The Philosophg of God., p. 22.
a total agent, they together have the same essential determination, each per se cause
(whether as an instrument cause or principal cause) is different in kind o r nature.
For example, the gardener digging with a spade, using his legs and arms, is a series of
different causes al1 of which act from the proper power of the principal agent; the
power of each cause participates as an instrument in the power of the principal
agent.
But how many causes can there be in a per se series? Can there be an infinite
number of them? Another way to put the question is this: Can the number of causes
in a per se series be an indeterminate number? Henri Renard gives a reason for an
emphatically negative answer. "Since the dependence of al1 the members of the
series is in the existential order, and, therefore, sirnultaneous, in an infinite series
there should exist simultaneously an infinite number of causes. Now, an actual
infinite number is clearly a c o n t r a d i ~ t i o n . "In
~ other words, because operating
causes actually exist, their number must be determined or fixed; their actuality fixes
that number. Now an infinite number is precisely an indeterminate number. Note
that we are not arguing against the possibility of an actually infinite number. St.
Thomas is the first to Say that "God knows infinites," and he atternpts to show how
God knows them." But we cannot use the premise that God knows infinites in

Renard. The Philosophy of God.. p. 23.

See De Ver., q. 2. a. 9, c. vol. 1, ed. cit. The following text explains very well the difference between
human and divine knowledge of the infinite: "For, since, 'the character of infinity fits quantity,' as the
Philosopher says, and quantity of its very nature has an order of parts, an infinite would be known by
way of its infinity if i t were known part by part ... Thus it is possible for Our intellect in some manner
to know an infinite continuum perfectly; but it cannot know an infinite number of things taken one
by one, since it cannot know many things by means of one species. [Thus, for the human intellect to
know the existent or the actual as infinite it would have to know existence as it is in itself; it would
have to know the one whose existence is identical with his essence, or whose essence is existence, but
clearly the human intelIect does not know such a one. Our knowledge of the actual is inseparable
frorn the knowledge of individuai contingent existents.] Hence, if Our intellect has to consider a
number of things, it has to know them one after another [not in an instantaneous grasp, which is
required for knowing an actually infinite set]. Consequently, it knows discontinuous quantity only
through continuous quantity. Therefore, if it were to know a multitude that is actually infinite, our
intelIect would be knowing an infinite according to its infinity, but that is impossible.
support of an argument for the possibility of an actually existent or actually infinite
number. If we have existents, we have a fked number of them, and whatever is fixed
in number cannot be both infinite and existent (which is to Say actual and, therefore,
determinate), it can only be one or the other, either determinate or not.
Renard gives another reason why an infinite per se series of causes is a
contradiction.
In a series of existentially subordinated causes, the influx of the first cause looks to the "to ben
(that is to Say, it has an influx on the "to be") of al1 the intermediate members, reaching even to
the Iast effect. [As St. Thomas says, "al1 lower (or secondary) efficient causes must be referred to
higher causes, as instrumental to principal agents." SCG,(II, 21, 5)] The reason is that the
intermediate causes are actuated here and now by the first cause. If, then, there were no first
cause, these intermediary causes would not be able to act. Now in an infinite series there is no
first cause and, therefore, no suficient reason for the actuation of the intermediate cause, no
causing of the Last effect, and therefore no effect. This is contradictory, since the effect is there: it
exists. Therefore, the series cannot be infinite.m

This argument for the impossibility of an infinite regress is really an argument

for the irrelevancy of the number of per se causes in an existential series. I t is an
argument for the daim that only one of these causes can be a cause that is not also
an effect. The argument relies on an insight about the nature of an effect that is
actually present here and now (hic et nunc). That insight is this: there can be no
explanation of an activity which is in fact originated (a caused activity) if it were
not originated by a source that itself was not originated (the number of originators
between the first unoriginated one and the effect is irrelevant). The insight will not

The divine intellect, however, knows al1 things through one species [Himselfl. Hence,
simultaneously and with one intuition, God has knowledge of al1 things. Consequently, He does not
know a multitude according to the order of its parts, and He can know an infinite multitude, but not
according to its infinity; for, if He were to know it according to its infinity so that H e would be
grasping part after part of the multitude, He would never come to its end and never know it
perfectly- 1 simply concede, therefore, that God actually knows infinites absolutely. These infinites,
however, are not equal to His intellect in the way in which He Himself as known equds His intellect;
for the essences of created infinites are, as it were, intensively infinite as whiteness is in an infinite
body. God's essence, however, is infinite i n al1 respects, and because of this al1 infinites are finite to
Him and.canbe comprehended by Him." Al1 of this, of course, presupposes the knowledge of God's
existence and some of his attributes.
aiRenard, The Philosophy of God., p. 23.
be grasped if, like Kenny, we think it nonsensical to differentiate between the
essential and existential determinants of causal activity, that is, if we disregard the
existential determinant. It is in seeing the contingency in the order of existence or
actuality of each of the secondary efficient per se causes that we see the need for one
that is not contingent with respect to his existence or actuality. The need becomes
apparent when we see the bankruptcy of the explanation of causal activity in t e m s
only of caused causes, even in terms of an infinite series of caused causes. Each of the
caused causes is causing with the borrowed act of existing; if the entire series,
regardless of how long, is a series of causes that is in debt with respect to its
existence, the entire series exists as still in need of being originated or given
existence, which is to Say that it does not exist. But that is false because we do see
the effect of that causal series existing here and now. I t is on the basis of this
certainty that we are warranted in drawing the conclusion that the fint in t h e
causal series is one who is not causing with a borrowed act of existing. We can see
here again how the denial of the supremacy of the act of existing in contingent being
is responsible for our missing how St. Thomas arrives at the First Cause of motion,
efficiency, or existence, etc.
Let us now look at a series of accidental causes. Recall that an accidental cause is
one that does not possess both the essential and the existential determinant of
causal action (that is, in accidental causality we cannot see both the principle of
proper causality and the principle of finality which explains why something is rather
than not). Recall also Our example of an accidental cause: a gardener digging out a
small ruby while cultivating his tomato plant. It is true that the gardener is a cause
of the ruby being dug out, but he is an accidental cause because his causal action
lacks one of the two necessary determinants of causal action, namely, the existential
determinant (he did not intend to dig out the gem). Consequently, an action of an
accidental cause has neither the first nor the last proper agent that are operating in
unison as proper causes; in other words, there is no operative series, no actual or
existent causal operators. It is true that the gardener's spade is actual, but it is not
an actual proper causal operator, but only an accidental operator. A series of such
causes could certainly be infinite in number because it woiild not be a nurnber of
operative existents, which as actual must be fixed or finite. St. Thomas explains the
difference between an infinity of a per se series and an accidental series:
An infinite series of efficient causes properly subordinate to one another is impossible, that is
causes that are perse required for the effect, as when a Stone is moved by a stick, a stick by a
hand, and so forth: such a series cannot be prolonged indefinitely. All the sarne an infinite series
of efficient causes accidentaliy subordinate to one another is not counted impossible, as when
they are al1 ranged under causai heading and how many there are is quite incidental [accidental].
For example, when a smith picks up many hamrners because one after another has broken in his
hand, it is accidental to one particular hammer that it is employed by another particular hammer.
And Iikewise it is accidental to this particuIar man as generator to be generated by another man,
for he generates as a man, not as the son of another man. For al1 men in begetting hold the same
rank in the order of efficient causes, namely that of being a particular parent. Hence it is not out
of the question for a man to be begotten by a man and so on endlessIy. This would not be the case
were this begetting to depend on another man or on material elements and the sun; such a series
cannot be indeterminable^25
The main point to take away ftom al1 this into our reading of the Five Ways is
that the pivotai question is not whether an infinite series is possible (we have shown
that it is not), but whether the causal series is caused by a cause that is only a cause
and not also an effect. It is irrelevant whether the caused series started or not. What
matters is that the number of causes (accidental or per se causes) is irrelevant
because that shifts the question of causality to: How did it get started? If it turns out
that each member of a series does not have within itself an explanation of a factor
present in it that needs explaining, no explanation of actual causal activity is
possible. But an effect is still present before us and "telling" us it is and it is an
effect, and both these things cal1 for an explanation; it is saying, "Look, 1 am, and I
am contingent." And this is precisely where lies the nature of the proper

@ST, 1, q. 46, a. 2, ad 7.1 have used a mixture of the translation of the Dorninican Fathers and the
translation of the Blackfriars edition because it seemed to me that in places one was clearer than the
other.
philosophical question: Why does the contingent, that which is but need not be, in
fact exist? The natural theologian's problem is not: Why does God exist? The
properly philosophical proof is not a piece of philosophizing that begins by saying,
"God exists because ..." God's existence can be demonstrated only when we begin to
take seriously the mystery of existence of contingent beings.
Owens advises that, if we wish to understand properly the Five Ways we must
not place thern "in the setting of nonexistentialist metaphysics like that of Aristotle,
nor on the abstract plain of modern logic. I t has to be examined according to the
function of metaphysics in the procedure of St. Thomas h i r n ~ e l f . "The
~ Theologian
explains the difference between the job of the logician and the philosopher.
The logician considers the way in which terms are predicated and not the existence of a thing.
Hence he says that whatever answer is given to the question "What is this thing?" pertains to
the quiddity. [In other words, to a logician a thing is never an existent as existing but always
a thing in some formal aspect of it.] But the philosopher, who inquires about the existence of
things and their final and efficient cause. does not include them under the quiddity since the are
extrinsic [that is, they do not at ali belong to thefotmalnotion of the thing in question].J
A glimpse of God, therefore, will be grasped, although very faintly, only by the
metaphysician when he makes and attempt to make intelligible the contingency and
the existence (esse) of that mhich is but need not be. The danger of trying to do
metaphysics as a logician is that one can easily slip into philosophizing about mere
concepts and never about that which actually is here and now. It is a bit like being
hungry and coming for a meal to a chef who tells you everything about his great new
recipe but never prepares the food. Just so, the work of a logician cannot feed the
hungry mind like the work of a philosopher of being can, because the mind wants
knowledge and knowledge is of being, not of concepts. Let us now try, as
metaphysicians, t o catch a glimpse of God by looking in the direction St. Thomas is
pointing, which is toward a real, not a merely conceived, act of being.

a~ o s e Owens,
~h St. Thomas on the Existence of God, p. 230.
427
In VliMetaph, lect. 17, n. 1658. Vol. II, p.613.
 The Ways
"Look! Look! The Lion!" cn-ed Lucy. m e r e did you think you saw him?" asked Susan. "Don't talk like a
grom-up,"said L u q , stamping herfoot. "I didn't think I saw hzm. Isaw him."

C. S. Lewis, P&ce Caspian

Five Ways To See the Same Thing

One advantage of having taken such a long and arduous way t o prepare the
proper context of the Five Ways is that we shall avoid a number of false approaches
to them. The most persistent of these in our day is a cosmological approach to the
Five Ways, particularly to the First Way which has to do with motion. Much of
what St. Thomas has to Say about motion he owes to Aristotle and some of it we
now know to be false. How much of it is false can be seen more clearly in the long
exposition of the way from motion in the thirteenth chapter of Summa Contra
Gentiles because there S t . Thomas reveals more of the thirteenth-century physicist's
understanding of motion. It is not surprising then that someone like Kenny, who
insists that the Five Ways are an attempt at a cosmologiGal demonstration of God's
existence and that the First Way deals exclusively with the motion of a moving
thing, will concentrate more on the proof from Summa Contra Gentiles to point out
the shortcomings of such an undentanding of motion and conchde from them that
they are responsible for the failure to prove God's existence. But we have seen in the
preceding chapters that St. Thomas makes a clear distinction between cosmology
and metaphysics, and that the latter is the science of the highest cause. W e have also
seen that for him metaphysics or first philosophy is the science of being as being
where the act of existing is the first and highest act. If then God, as the highest and
proper cause of the act of being, is encountered by the intellect in metaphysics
rather than physics, and if metaphysics is first and foremost concerned with
existence, a proof for God's existence must for St. Thomas be an existential proof.
The First Way will therefore not be concerned primarily with the physicist's
understanding of motion, but with the existence of an existent in motion; the cause
we are seeking is not the cause of the nature of motion but of the existence of a
moving being (for, remember. the intellect first comes into contact with contingent
being when it comes into contact with a being in motion). If this were not so, St.
Thomas would not Say that the way to God from motion is the more manifest way
because the physicist's understanding of motion is hardly manifest without a great
deal of insightful reflection and experimentation. He calls it more manifest because
anyone can see its starting point. Causality and being which are the second and
third ways are not so manifest, and we shall better see these ways having first been
prepared by the first and more manifest way. The light that the way of motion
shines is not from motion itself, for really, there is no such thing; there are only
moving beings, which is to Say contingent beings, which is to Say contingent
existents. The light of the First Way is the light of the cause of a moving thing's
existence, which is also the cause of the existence of a secondary efficient cause. and
so on. It makes little difference, then, that in the argument in SCG 1, 13 the
Theologian is more explicit about his understanding of motion than in ST,1, q. 2, a.
3, because even from a perfect understanding of motion we cannot arrive at the
existence of anything, let alone the existence of God who cannot move, that is,
cannot go from potency to act.
 Thus the difference of the Ways consists in their different starting points which
are al1 effects and as such must have their own proper cause which is either a First
Mover, a First Efficient Cause, a First Being, and so on. But we must see an
important point that flows from this: To conclude to a First of each category of
effects and to stop there is to leave that First within a category of effects, and ther?
move on to a next category and leave its First in it once we found it; this still leaves
us in the dark with respect to the cause of multiplicity, although now not with the
multiplicity of contingent beings but with the multiplicity of First causes. This
would make the Five Ways five different proofs of five different Firsts which still
need to be connected somehow to "that which al1 men call God."
But the Five Ways are not only different, they are also the same. They are not
the same in that they atl reach the existence of the First of each category; in this
they are still different because the categories or modes of being of which these are
the First are different.= Therefore, each of the Firsts must be brought t o the final
step, the step where we see that al1 these existing Firsts are not many but one
existent who is not qualified so as to account for the qualification of its effect in
terms of which we discovered it, namely that they are that which al1 men call God-
Remember, God does not exist because he is the cause of the existence of contingent
beings. St. Thomas puts the point similarly when he says,
*if the words, God is good, signified no more that, God is the cause of good things, i t might in like
manner be said that God is a body inasmuch as he is the cause of bodies ...
**these names are applied to God not as the cause only, but dso essentially. For the words,
God isgood, or wise, signiS not only that He is the cause of wisdom or goodness, but that these
exist in Hirn in a more excellent ~ q r . ~
Thus if good, wise,AND being did not apply to God "in a more excellent way," they
would express the claim that God's goodness, wisdom, and more importantly for our
purposes, existence, is like the creature's existence, which is to Say contingent. A

m ~ t Thomas
. speaks of different categones or grades of being in De Vw., q. 1, a. 1.
m*ST', 1.q. 13.a.2. **ST,1.q. 13.a 6.
proof for God's existence would then be only a proof of a being that is very powerful
indeed, but still only a creature, and therefore an effect whose cause we have not
found.
Furthermore, St. Thomas' use of the word via is not a poetic substitute for
probatio or demomtratio. Nowhere does he speak of a way as proof and vice versa. He
begins the Five Ways by saying, "there are five ways by which it can be proved that
God is." He does not Say there are five different proofs! What, then, is this five to
one relationship-five kays to one God? I t is the relationship of five aays of
reaching the First Cause, and in each way the First Cause is the one God. The Five
Ways of St. Thomas are five routes to reaching the First Cause, but 'lover and above
the conclusion in each way there must be a reflection upon that existent to which
we have corne, in order to see that it is the Ipsum esse. If such a refiection were not
necessary, St. Thomas should obviously conclude, not the 'there exists one whom
everyone understands to be God,' but: God e x i ~ t s . " ~
Smith notices another interesting point. "The middle term of al1 demonstrations
concerning the nature of God, the Ipsurn esse or its equivalent, is constantly plucked
from its source in Quest. 2, art. 3, utrum Deus sit. Surely, the Ipsum esse could not be
drawn hom art. 3 unless it were there.""'
Let us see then how each of the ways reaches to that being who is identically his
own act of existing, who is God and not a god. W e are now in good position to do
this by considering different expositions offered by a host of interpreters who take
seriously the Theologian's existential metaphysics. The best known of these are

"Smith, Natuml Theology,p. 88.

lbid.
Mortimer J. Adler ("The Demonstration of God's Existence," The Thomist, V (1943), 193) points out
the folIowing text in support of the d a i m that there is only one demomtratio worked out in five
different ways: "In speculative things the medium of demonstration, which demonstrates the
conclusion perfectly, is one only; whereas probable means of proof are many." ST, 1, q. 47, a. 1, ad 3.
Etienne Gilson, Jacques Maritain, Joseph Owens, Henri Renard, Gerard Smith,
Maurice Holloway, and E.L. Mascall. In rny estimation, the most helpful and
convincing is the interpretation of Gerard Smith whose many insights I have tned
to unpack in chaptee nine and ten by employing texts fioom St. Thomas and my own
reflections on them. I shall, therefore, continue to rely on him, as well as on the
other mentioned philosophers.

The First Way

St. Thomas' most manifest way to the First or Proper Cause of the act of being is
as follows:

The first and the more manifest way, however, is that which is taken with respect to motion. For
it is certain and established b y sense that sorne things in this world are in motion. Now
everything that is moved [is in motion] is moved by another. Indeed, nothing is moved except
insofar as it is in potency to that toward which it is moved. But something moves inasmuch as it
is in act; for to move is nothing other than to lead out something from potency into act, but
something is not able to be reduced from potency into act except through something which is in
act: thus the actually hot, like fire, makes wood which is potentially hot be actuaily hot and
through this moves and alters it. Now it is not possible that the same thing be simultaneously in
act and in potency in the sarne way, but only in a different way:m that which is actually hot
cannot simuItaneously be potentially hot; but it is simultaneously potentially cold. I t is
impossible therefore that the same thing in the same way be moving and moved o r that i t should
move itself. It is necessary therefore that everything that is moved be moved by another. If
thcrefore that by which i t is moved is itself moved, it is necessary that it itself be moved by
another, and that by another. But this cannot proceed into infinity, because in this way
something would not be moving first [there would not be a first mover] and consequently no
other mover, because second movers do not move except insofar as they are moved by the first
mover, just as a stick does not move except insofar as it is rnoved by the hand. Therefore i t is
necessary to arrive at some first mover which is moved by nothing, and this al1 understand to be
~od?
St. Thomas does not find it necessary to explain here in any detail what sort of
motion or change we are to think about. Nor is the scientific (in the modern sense)

In the Blackfrian edition of Sumrna TheoZogiae Timothy McDermott elaborates this point by
engiishing the Latin this way: "the same thing cannot at the sarne time be both actually x and
potentiaIly x, though it can be actuallyx and potentially y."
433
ST,1, q. 2, a. 3, my own translation. My source of the Latin text for each Way is the edition of
Cornmissio Piana of the Institute of Medieval Studies in Ottawa. Compare the argument of the First
Way to ST, 1, q. 105,a. 2-4; 1-11?q. 9, a. 4; SCG,1, 13; I,22; II, 6; II, 54; In Metaph., XII, lect. 3
understanding of motion t o the point; Newton's and Einstein's insights are welcome,
but nothing depends on them. The only data we cannot do without is the data,
established by sense (not by experimentation of a physicist), of motion or change of
some things in the world. W e have already discussed in some detail a deeper reason
for the need of this data? the first thing we notice about an existent is that it is
moving or changing; the knowledge of an existent is first of al1 the knowledge of
that which is moving, and this makes an ideal starting point for a proof of an
existent who is identically his own act of existing.
Thus the motion or change of an actually existing thing is the subject matter or
the data of the First Way, and it is this that must be philosophically, that is,
rnetaphysically, explained. Now because we are, as metaphysicians, interested in
ultimate causes, it will not suffice to have the meaning of a moving thing provided
only by physicists, that is, by the sort of causes that fa11 into their field of inquiry,
which are only a series of intermediary causes whose causal power needs explaining.
We need the understanding of the philosopher of being; in this case, the philosopher
of a moving or changing being considered as being. Much of what we have said in
chapters five through ten has prepared us well for a metaphysician's understanding
of a being undergoing change, and the causes of such a being. What remains now is
to apply that understanding to the argument St. Thomas is making.
The argument of the First Way may be laid out in several ways. In surveying the
different layouts offered by different interpreters, 1 find that those who are well
equipped with metaphysical groundwork lay it out differently than those who are
not. The reason is that they differ in their understanding of what precisely is the
data of the First Way which must be explained. Those paying little attention to the
primacy the act of existing has in the Theologian's metaphysics concentrate on his

~ e above
e pp. 152-155.
Aristotelian understanding of intermediary causes of m o t i o n . 1 have argued
enough already against such interpretations: the mind in its present state cannot get
to God by doing physics any more than by doing biology, sociology, or economics,
and St. Thomas knows it well.
1shall therefore follow the layout of the argument understood in the context of
existential metaphysics. As such the argument has four propositions: 1) Sorne things
in the world are moving or changing. 2) Everything that is moved (changed) is
moved (changed) by "some other." 3)Because "some other" is a per se or proper or
existential cause, it must be unmoved if motion (change) is to be explained in a
properly philosophical way. 4) There must be a mover (changer) that does not move
(change), and this al1 understand to be God. The same layout of the argument
applies to the text in SCG 1, 13.
The first three propositions have been established in chapter ten where we
considered further the principle of causality. In explaining the propositions 1shall
occasionally recall relevant points. The first proposition calls for only one insight.
We are speaking here of subjects of change which as such are not necessarily also
changing something else. Al1 that interests us is a being that is, in some way,
undergoing change. We have already corne across the insight required here:
everything proceeding from potentiality to actuality cornes first to an incomplete
act, which is the medium between potentiality and actuality. It does not matter
whether we are talking about that which is doing the changing or that which is

I do not know if anyone has attempted to recast St. Thomas' argument from motion in Iight of the
most recent and better understanding of its intermediary causes. But if the sciences of physics and
metaphysics are as different as St. Thomas says they are, and given that for him any philosophical
God-talk must be conducted in the sontext of philosophy of being as being, any modern attempt to
recast the argument could not have a signifiant affect on a successful arriva1 at the conclusion that
God exists. Either St. Thomas has successfully demonstrated the conclusion as a rnetaphysician or he
has not.
" ~ e eST, 1, q. 85, a. 3, and above pp. 151-152.
being changed? The point is that whatever goes from potency t o act (either as the
mover or the moved) cornes first t o an incomplete act. A properly philosophical
explanation of motion or change is an explanation of being in this incomplete act; a
being which is no longer only in potentiality and not yet in actuality. In other
words, we need to explain a being in the process of being actualised, or more
technically, a being's passive potency (which of course requires an act) or the
actuation of passive potency. Renard says that, in considering motion, "the First
Way considers the passivity of beings, their becoming as they are m ~ v e d . "Recall
~
our example of the changing tomato. A properly philosophical explanation of its
change is an explanation of how the tomato, which is able to be red, and is no longer
quite green nor yet quite red, is here and now becoming red.
The second proposition needs one clarificationm and it concerns living beings
insofar as they move themselves. The principle whatever is moved is moved by
another is clear enough when we are talking about a transitive operation: an
operation where one thing moves another (a gardener digging the soil), or an
operation of a thing that is moved by another (the soil being dug up; this too is an
operation because without the soil's being able to be dug up it could not be dug up).
It is, however, more difficult to see the principle a t work when operations are the
perfection of an actual operator which do not bring about a change in another; for
example, a human being's act of willing, knowing, and feeling are al1 operations
which neither move nor are rnoved. They are immanent operations of living
operators and are not movements, but they imply change. St. Thomas explains:

For to understand is not a inovement that is an act of something imperfect passing from one to
another, but it is an act, existing in the agent itself, of sornething perfect. Likewise that the

That is, it does not matter whether the data are that of the First Way (that which is being
changed) or of the Second Way (that which is doing the changing).
a Renard, The Philosophy of God., p. 37.
= ~ h eproposition has already been established on pp. 235-238.
 intellect is perfected by the intelligible object, ie., is assimilated to it, this belongs to an intellect
which is sometimes in potentiality; because the fact of its being in a state of potentiality makes it
differ from the intelligible object and assimilates it thereto through the intelligible species, which
is the likeness of the thing understood, and makes it to be perfected thereby, as potentiality is
perfected by act. On the other hand the divine intellect, which is no way in potentiality, is not
perfected by the inteIli ible object, nor is it assimilated thereto, but is its own perfection, and its
own intelligible object. a,
The last sentence helps to clarify the matter. The reason why an immanent action
implies change is that the operator is not identically that action, not "its own
perfection," but nevertheless receives the action; the operator still moves from
potency t o act, still has its potencies actuated. God, who does not have any
potentiality in him, and therefore no change (is unmoved), performs the immanent
operations of knowing and loving without any implication of change because he is
identically truth and love (if he were not, he would not be God but only another
creature whose acts are actuated potencies). Thus the principle, whatever is moved
is moved by another, applies to everything except God; everything but God is
subject to the causal power of "some other". Even though a human being, for
example, is not in motion with respect to the immanent operation of knowing when
the operation is taking place, that operation is still actuated by the intelligible
species known?' And so the properly philosophical explanation of motion calls for
an explanation of the being of even this incomplete act of immanent operation; we
still need to account for the being which is no longer only in potentiality and not
yet in actuality; we still need to explain the actuation of passive potency.

~ n o t h e rtext rnay be considered. "When i t is said that something is moved by itself, it is

considered to be rnoving and moved; but when it is said that something is moved by another, one
thing is considered to be moving and another moved. But it is clear that when something moves
another, it does not follow from the fact that it is rnoving another that it is considered the first
mover. Whence sornething moving another does not exclude the fact that i t itself may be moved by
another and similarly have from this other the fact that it is a mover. In the same way, when
sornething moves itself, this does not exclude the fact that it may be moved by another, and have
from this other the power to move itself." St. Thomas Aquinas, De Malo, q. 3, a. 2, ad 4, in Opera
Omnia, ed. Parmae, vol, VIII. (New York: Musurgia Publishers, 1949). p. 262.(My own translation)
 I know that this looks like a very narrow window of being, and it is very narrow,
but it is the window of the moved being insofar as it is being achieved. Being which
is not yet moved ( is purely in the state of potentiality with respect to some act; it is
the not x), or which is already moved (is no longer in potentiality with respect to
some act; it is here and now x) is a much wider window through which we see
being." But it is not the window through which we can see the moving or changing
being; only by seeing it where it is can we properly, that is, philosophically, account
for its cause.
The third proposition requires a good understanding of why and how the need
for a cause arises when we try to make change intelligible.- Remember that we said
that if the change of a green tomato turning red is to be a change and not merely a
succession of completely new unconnected entities, the tomato cannot both be
green and red at the same time and becorne green and red. Given that the tomato
does not have redness from itself and does in fact have it, it rnust receive it from
some red thing like the Sun. Thus t o be changed is to be changed by "sorne ~ t h e r . " ~

I t is precisely into this wider window thar Newton is looking when he says: "Every body
continues in a state of rest, or of uniform motion in a straight line, unless it is compelled t o change
that state by forces impressed upon it." This principle treats motion and rest as two states; the state
of being before it moves, and the state of being already in motion. And of course, Aristotle's maxim
"every thing that is being moved is necessarily being moved by some thing" if applied to either of
these states, is a false maxim. But that is not where it should apply. If the Philosopher and t h e
Theologian wanted to apply it there, they were w o n g , but that does not mean the maxim is wrong, it
only means that it is misapplied. T h e maxim claims that whatever is moved from the state of potency
t o actuality is moved by that which is already in actuality, and Newton's principle does not
contradict that.
Recall the discussion on pp. 228-232.
m ~ h third
e proposition is stated a n explained by St. Thomas in the First w a y thus: "Now it is not
possible that the same thing be simultaneously in act and in potency in the same way, but onIy in a
different way: that which is actually h o t cnnot simultaneousIy be potentially hot; but i t is
simultaneously potentially cold. It is impossible therefore that the same thing in the sarne way be
moving and moved or that i t should move itself. It is necessary therefore that everything that is
moved be moved by another."
 But we must see that this principle holds true not just before the tomato is red
(when the need for "some other" can be seen from the complete lack of the new
characteristic), nor after the tomato is completely red (when it is again obvious that
the new characteristic is indeed new and not due to the changed thing), but we
must see it in that narrow window of changing being. 1mean, we must see the "some
other" a t that interval between the purely potentially red actual tomato and the
actually red actual tomato; we must see the cause as hic et nunc causing that which is
becoming actual to be actual. Smith says, "this is more difficult t o see, because here
the presence of the actual and the potential in the same subject is simultaneous."~1
Say, unless we see it, we must grant Hume's account of causality as mere constant
conjunction, and consequently his skepticism. But this "seeing" is not perceiving;
for Hume it can only be that because the mind is exclusively a perceiving faculty; for
St. Thomas the "seeing" is an act of the intellect. But for Hume there can be no
explanation of change because there is no change, properly speaking, taking place;
there is only that which we see after change took place, in which case we can Say
that perhaps there was a cause and perhaps not, but the knowledge of the cause is
not required for the perception of that which now is perceived and before was not
perceived. This is why we need to see that St. Thomas is "looking" at change while it
is taking place for it is only there that there can be that which calls for an
explanation through a cause, namely, the changing being. An explanation which
says that a cause gave the subject of change the stimulus and left it to itself is no
explanation at all, because it is not an explanation of change in that narrow window
where change is in fact taking place. If change is in fact taking place, it must be
taking place because the changer is doing the changing hic et nuncM6

a Smith, Natural lneology.,p. 106.

@ " ~ h a some
t things are in motion-for example, the sun-is evident from sense. Therefore, i t is
moved by something else that moves it [not by something which at one t h e moved another
thing.]"SCG, 1, 13,3 (itaiics mine).
 Now it is precisely in the context of this point that the question of the number of
actual changers doing the changing is irrelevant, because any number of them (even
if it be infinite, which is impossible) which were themselves being caused to do the
changing while the change is taking place, would not explain the change taking
place here and now; such causes only postpone the e ~ p l a n a t i o nBut
. ~ given that
the explanation is needed because the change is actuai (not because our intellectual
curiosity has to be satisfied, asJJ.C. Smart maintains), which is to Say that an actual
existent is changing, there must actually be a changer (mover or cause), which is to
Say a changer that exists, that is itself not changed and from which the actual change
is here and now proceeding. In other words, the cause of actual change is the cause
of the existence of an existent-as-changing, whereas the other, intermediary causes
(no matter how many of them there be) are causes only of the becoming of that
existent. We may group al1 the intermediary causes and cal1 them second cause or an
instrument of the change of the unchanged changer. The point to see, and we shall
explore it further below, is that the Sun and perhaps also water, soil, and a host of
other causes are responsible for the tomato becoming red, but they are not
responsible for the tomato eristing whi!e becoming red. For St. Thomas, to arrive at
an actuality of something is to arrive a t an actual existent, not at an essence, not at a
that mhich (a changer or the cause of change), but at one who exercises an act of
existing"3

Consider the ollowing point. "When investigating the nature of anything, one should make the
same kind of anaIysis as he makes when he reduces a proposition to certain self-evident principles.
Othenvise, both types of knowledge will become involved in an infinite regress, and science and our
knowledge of things will parish." St. Thomas, De Ver., q. 1, a. 1. In Hume's conception of causality as
constant conjunction an infinite regress is quite possibIe, because there is no such thing as an actual
effect, there is only that which succeeds another which is itself preceded by still some other, and so
on. We need not stop anywhere because there is no need to in Hume's picture. But neither is there in
Hume's picture a proper explanation. Thus skepticism, whether Hume's or that of our
conternporaries, is quite at home with an infinite regress.
468 This will puzzle someone like Anthony Kenny because he does not take seriously enough the
 With this we have reached the fourth proposition which is really a conclusion:
therefore there exists a first unchanged changer or a first unmoved mover. But the
fourth propositions contains another part: and this al1 understand to be God. We
must ask ourselves: Why does everyone understand this to be God? or What does it
mean to understand the First Mover as God or as not God? We have already
touched upon the answer in the introduction to this chapter. Let us look again at
what St. Thomas says, but this time in different words.
If, for example, 'God is good' rneant the same as 'God is the cause of goodness in creatures, the
word 'good' as applied to God wouId have contained within its meaning the goodness of the
creature; hence 'good' would apply pnmarily to creatures and secondarily to God.
But words of this sort do not only Say how God is the cause, they also Say what he is. When we
Say he is good or wise we do not simply mean that he causes wisdom or goodness [and, we may
add, motion, efficiency, being, and so on], but that he possesses these perfections transcendently.
We conclude, therefore, that from the point of view of what the word means it is used prirnarily
of God and derivatively of creatures, for what the word means-the perfection i t signifies-flows
from God to the creature. But from the point of view of our use of the word we apply it to
creatures because we know them first. That is why it has a way of signikng that is appropriate
to creatures.449

If, then, we had a First Mover that was not God, it would be a First Mover of
whom it could be said that it is a mover that moves without being moved, but it
could not be said that it possesses this power of moving by its very nature. In other
words, the name rnouer could not be applied to it "in a more excellent way," or, it
could not be said that it is identically its power of moving but has the power as a
result of having received it, which betrays its characteristic of potentiality. Note,
however, that we are not seriously considering the possibility that there could be a
First Mover that is a creature, and one that is not. We are only trying to ascertain
the meaning of the First Mover as a creature in order that we rnay see a little more
clearly From that meaning why the First Mover cannot be a creature, that is, why he

importance of the act of existing in St. Thomas philosophy. And because he does not take it senously,
he will pronounce this kind of interpretation of the Five Ways nonsensical. It should be clear by now
that such an interpretation is not nonsensical. I t will also puzzle Peter Geach because for him it is
enough to explain the existence of a child, for example, by the generative causal act of the parent.
449
ST, 1, q. 13, a. 6. (Blackfriars translation. Emphasis mine.)
must be that which everyone understands t o be God. Note also that our claim that
the characteristic of the F i ~Mover
t as the First Mover must apply to him in a more
excellent way does not anse from our knowledge of the essence of the First Mover,
but from a reflection on the nature of a contingent being, even if, by hypothesis, that
being is a First Mover.
What, then, does it mean to Say that everyone understands the First Mover to
be God? At this point it will be helpful t o recall the above section on the nominal
definition of God, and to keep in mind the reason why a regress (infinite or not) is
irrelevant. We shall not be able to answer the question so long as we think the
answer must come from a cornparison of the philosophically reached First Mover
and an othenvise understood God; the answer will not come from recognizing the
latter in the former or vice versa. The reason why everyone understands the First
Mover to be God is to be found in the reflection upon the First Mover. The reason
why there must be a First Mover is not owed to the fact that he moves other things.
That he rnoves (here and now) other things, which we know because we know that a
thing which is moving (here and now) exists and also know that it could not exist
unless it were being caused (here and now) to exist, is the reason why we know that
there is a First Mover. We do not want to rnake the mistake of an essentialist proof
for God's existence where we conclude the reason for his existence from our
knowledge of his essence. We do not want to Say that God would not exist if there
were no First Mover; if there were no First Mover, there would be no First Way,
nothing more. W e Say that God exists, not because he rnoves another, although that
is how we know that he exists, but because his activity or perfection of moving
another is "possessed by God transcedcntally," that is, he possesses this act or
perfection as one who is that act.
Now the reason why we know that God must be his perfection or activity of
moving another is the same reason why we know that there must be a First Mover,
namely, the in-eleuancy of a regress. The irrelevancy of which we are speaking here
does not have to do with movers but with possessors of the power of motion. The
moment we reach the First Mover we ask: How does it stand with his power of
motion? Is his possession of that power received or not? If it is, we have not yet
reached a true First, a truly Unrnoued Mover, because to receive sornething is to be
moved, as we saw above in connection with the motion of Living things. Therefore,
to be the First Mover must mean that he is his own perfection of moving another,
that he does not receive this perfection but is that perfection.
But if this is so, have we not got ourselves into a serious trouble? Are we forced
to conclude that God as the cause is identical with the effect, because to be a cause
is to be a cause of something, and this would make God's being dependent on that
which he as a cause causes? If God is his activity of moving another, and if we "see"
the motion of the effect, which is to Say the effect existing as moving, how do we
"take" God out of the different modes or categories of being? How do we separate
God, as the activity of moving another, from that which he as that activity must
move? Note that we are not asking how to see God as outside being, but how to
speak of him so that a category of being does not apply to him, but that rather he is
that category, which is a "more excellent way" of applying.
At this point 1hear an objection: What do you mean when you Say that to "see"
the motion of the effect is to "see" the effect existing as moving? Recall that any
change is really a move from potency to act. This move is the point of our focus
now.- Recall also our discussion of change. If change is real, that is, if there is in

Consider what St. Thomas has to Say about the composition of act and potency. "Whatever is
present in a thing from an agent must be act, for it belongs to an agent to make something in act ...
substances have being [existence] from the first agent; and the substances themselves are caused by
the fact that they have being [existence] from another. Therefore, being [existence] is present in
caused substances as a certain act of their own. But that in which act is present [as opposed to that
which is its own act] is a potentiality, since act, as such, is referred to potentiality." SCG, II, 53,3.
"Being [which is to Say existence and not an essence] itself is the proper act, not of the matter,
fact simultaneously change and that which is not change, namely the subject of
change, then the perfection acquired by the subject through change is not
identically that subject. The redness is not the tomato, or else it could not receive it
from the Sun. This is the point Heraclitus stressed. But there is another side t o the
story of change; it is the side from the standpoint of the acquired perfection. This is
the side Heraclitus did not see. The first point is this: there can be no change-there
can be no becoming red, unless there be the subject of change-unless there is the
subject which becomes red. The essentialists see this point very clearly. But there is
yet another point we must see. W e shall only see it if we ask: what is the
relationship between the perfection acquired through change and the subject which
is becoming that perfection? Smith answers this way: "the becoming-of-a-subject is
for that subject to exist ... W e must see that the surplus [the acquired perfection] so
affects the subject of i t that for that subject to-be-becoming-the-surplus [which is
that very narrow window of changing being] is, for the subject, to-be-existing.""'
Let us make sure we do see. We do not want to make the mistake of forgetting
that a changing being cannot be unless it is in fact changing, and that it can only
change if it is in fact existing. But we do forget this, very oken. We see that this
thing which is here and now has changed; the green tomato has become red. W e
then think that we have explained the change by invoking the sun's power of
communicating redness to the tomato. We have not! W e have left out entirely the
explanation of the tomato-existing-as-becoming-red! To-be-becoming-red is for the

but of the whole substance; for being is the act of that whereof we c m Say that it is. Now this act is
predicated not of the matter, but of the whole. Hence, matter cannot be called that which is; rather,
the substance itself is that which is.
In substance cornposed of matter and forrn there is a twofold composition of act and potentiality;
the first, of the substance itself which is composed of rnatter and forrn; the second of the substance
thus composed, and being [existence]; and this composition also can be said to be of that which is and
being, o r of that which is and that by which a thing is." SCG,I I , 5 4 , 3 and 9.
"' Smith, Naturd TheoZogy., p. 109-110.
tomato to exist, no less then to-be-red is it for it to exist. We see the latter but
forget the former.
Consider again the following text of St. Thomas:
In substance composed of matter and form there is a twofold composition of act and potentiality;
the first, of the substance itself which is composed of rnatter and form; the second of the
substance thus composed, and being [existence]; and this composition also can be said to be of
that which is and being, or of that which is and thar by which a thing is-
The main point of this text is that as long as we have a composite of any sort, we
have a composite of potentiality and actuality. But any composite of potentiality
and actuality still needs to be explained through a cause which is not a mixture of
act and potency but a pure act.
The composite which lies before us now is the composite of the subject of change
being caused to be the acquired perfection of that change (the tomato-being-caused-
to-be-red), and the act of existing of that subject (not of the subject before it is
being caused to acquire the perfection, nor after it has already acquired it). The
composite calls for an expianation because the act of existing of the subject
becoming the acquired perfection needs a cause. Smith puts the question this way:
"What is causing the composite to exist inasrnuch as i t is causing the composite to
be c o m p ~ s i t e ? " ~
Only one candidate is up to the task. In Our example the green tornato cculd not
be this cause because it would have to be changed before it Lschanged, in which case
there would be no change. Nor could it be the red tomato because at one time it was
rnerely potentially red having no actuality of redness in it. The Sun is also not able
to do the job because it is only the second mover, and as such a cause only of the
redness of the tomato and not of the tomato existing-as-becoming-red. The Sun, we
may Say, presupposes the existence of the changing subject; it in no way accounts for
it. We may, along with Kenny, object at this point and Say: But isn't change or
motion really in question here rather than existence? If i t is, the sun is a good
enough explanation. The answer is that change alone is not in question, but the
subject of change is (which is to Say substance, or the proper subject of to be, in this
case the subject of to be undergoing a change from green to redm). The red tomato
was not in existence before it becarne red. It will not do to retort, "But the tomato
was!" There is no such thing as tomato except in Plato's world of Forms. The tomato
we may have in mind at the point of our objection is either a potentially existing red
tomato (which is precisely what calls for a cause) or an actually existing not-red
tomato. In either case the red tomato was nonexistent as an actual (hic et nunc)
subject of actual (hid et nunc) change. To put the matter bluntly, it will not do to
try and dodge causality as it is understood by St. Thomas by refusing to look
through t h e narrow window of changing being and seeing there not just change or
motion b u t the existence of the subject as changing. The window is still there
whether we wish to look through it or not because the effect existing as effect is here
and now revealing openly both its contingent act of existing and its contingent
essence. We cannot turn a blind eye to the need to account for the existence of the
subject of change and posit as the explanation of that change a cause that
presupposes the existence of the subject to which it is communicating a new
perfection. The existence of a thing and the fact that it is changing are not identical.
"Though motion may occur for any existing thing, motion is apart from the being of
the thingr'- We need a cause that causes the subject's existence precisely at the
point at which it is existing as receiving the new perfection, which is what it means
to Say that it is in motion or changing, but the it is an existent existing here and now
as moving. And "the movable does not depend on the mover [some intermediary or

*Recall our discussion in chapter eight about the composite of essence and existence.
SCG, III, 65.5.
secondary cause of its motion] for its being, but only for its being moved."= The
aspect of being moved is not the only thing that requires explanation in the First
Way. We need, therefore, a cause of be-ing of that which is being moved. This is
what the first mover does. How do we know that? St. Thomas answers:
Whatever belongs to a thing is either caused by the principles of its nature (as the capacity for
laughter in man) or comes to it from an extrinsic principle (as light in the air from the influence
of the sun). Now being itself [esse] cannot be caused by the form o r quiddity of a thing (by
'caused' I mean by an efficient cause), because that thing would then be its own cause and wouId
bring itself into being, which is impossible- It follows that everything whose being is distinct
fiom its nature must have being [rom another. And because everything that exists through
another is reduced to that which exists through itself as to its first cause, there musc be a reality
that is the cause of being for al1 other things, because it is pure being [esse tanturn]. If this were
not so, we would go on to infinity in causes [which is both impossible and irrelevant], for
everything that is not pure being has a cause of its being, ... from the first being, which is being in
al1 its purity; and this is the fint cause, or ~ o d . "

This shows very clearly that God as the cause of the existence of the moving
thing as moving is not that effect and is radically different fiom it. Further support
for this daim can be found in both Summas.
If a thing's existence differs from its nature, that existence must be externally caused. But we
cannot Say this about God, whom we have seen to be the first cause [St. Thomas is referring to
the article of the Five Ways which indicates that he thinks the pure being is there to be found.
And how shall we find it there except as the cause of the existence of moving, efficient, etc.
being?]. Neither then can we say that God's existence is other than his nature.
Anything that exists either is itself existence or partakes of it. Now, God, as we have seen,
exists. [St. Thomas is again referring to the Five Ways, and this tirne he says that in them we saw
the God exists, not just that which al1 understand to be God.] If then he is not himself existence,
and thus not by nature existent [but caused to be existent], he will only be a partaker of
existence. And so he will not be the primary existent. God therefore ...is his own existence-

In the context of the First Way this amounts to saying that God as the First Cause
of the subject existing as changing does not have his act of existing from that causal
activity but from hirnself. If he did not have it in such a way, he would not be the
First and Proper Cause. 1s this circular reasoning? No! We can recast the last
sentence to show why it is not: If God did not have the act of existing from himself,

*SCG, II, 57, 12.

On Beingand Essence, ch. IV, 7, ed. cit.
" ST,1, q. 3, a. 4. (Blackfriars translation.)
there would be no First and Proper Cause of the existence of the subject of change
while changing. There is on!y one First Cause. What makes him first is that he is
identically that which he does; what makes him the only is that everything else in
reality is not identically its own act of existence. THISeveryone understands to be
God, which claim we can noire, see to be the same as: therefore God exists.
We can drive home the point even harder. In his first Sumrna the Theologian
says: "Each thing is through its own being. Hence, that which is not its own being is
not through itself a necessary being. But God is through Himself a necessary being.
He is, therefore, His own being esse^."^ This can also be expressed by saying that
al1 things in the realm of contingent being differ from one another by being beings of
one sort or another, or by belonging to some categories of being and not to others.
But God is different from every other being not in virtue of some category of being,
but in virtue of be-ing which is an act of existing. Now the act of existing applies to
everything regardless of the category of being that applies to it. Therefore, act of
existing is not a category. And if God is identically the act of existing, which he
must be if a changing existent, at least, is to be completely accounted for, then he is
outside al1 categories or genus of being, he does not exist in some wuy but is
existence. Therefore we really do know that God does in fact ex&!
The objections to al1 this will be legion. All of them, however, will miss, or
ignore, or inadequately appreciate the legitimacy and autonomy of the act of
existing over al1 other acts which realify a contingent existent and cal1 for a cause.
Until their authors see this act for what it is, any attempt a t a reply to their
objections will be futile.

SCG, 1.22.5. We can see from this that St. Thomas is not asserting a logkali'' necessary being, as
Smart sees such assertions.
 Just as the First Way is concerned with the passivity of beings, the Second Way
is concerned with their activity. Both ways are concerned with causality; the First
with the recipient of causal action, the Second with the agent of causal action. What
gives rise to the inquiry of the First Way is the fact that there is actually, in
existence, an effect whose actuality as an effect here and now needs explaining.
What gives rise to the inquiry of the Second Way is the fact that there is actually, in
existence, a cause whose actuality as a cause here and now needs explaining.
St. Thomas' states his argument this way:

The second way is from the nature [ratione]of the efficient cause. For we find in the sensible
things that there is an order of efficient causes; for we never observe, nor is i t possible, that
something is the efficient cause of itself, because in that case it would precede itself which is
impossible. But i t is not possible that in efficient causes [the order] should proceed to infinity.
[This is sol because in al1 ordered efficient causes the first is the cause of the intermediate and
the intermediate is the cause of the ultimate (whether the intermediate be many or only one),
but if a cause is removed, the effect is removed. Therefore if there was not the first in the order of
efficient causes, there will not be the ultimate nor the intermediary. But if in efficient causes the
order proceeds t o infinity, there will not be the first efficient cause, and in this way there will be
neither the ultimate effect nor the intermediary efficient cause, which is openly fdse. Therefore
it is necessary to posit some first efficient cause, to which ail give the oame ~ o d . ~

This argument has three propositions: 1) We find in sensible things an order of

efficient causes. 2) An order of efficient causes is such that it requires the first
efficient cause. 3) Therefore it is necessary to posit some first efficient cause, to
which al1 give the name God.
We shall proceed in the same manner as in the First Way, namely, by unpacking
each proposition. The first proposition reveals the data from which we shall
conclude to God: it is an order or a series of per se causes. As we saw in chapter ten,
a per se cause is one to which apply both the principle of proper causality and the
principle of finality; a per se cause possesses both the essential and the existential
determinants of causal activity. Again, if we overlook the existential determinant of

"~ e also
e ST,1, q. 46, a. 2; SCG, 1, 13; II, 21; In Metaph., II, lect. 2.
a per se cause, through it we shall not amve a t the existence of anything; at best we
shall have a partial description of zeihat the First Per Se Cause looks like, if it exists.
A series of per se causes is one in which al1 of its rnembers act together at the
same time and in one definite way rather than another to produce an effect that is of
one kind rather than another. For example, our gardener, his spade, etc., are a series
of per se causes of a particular intelligible activity, namely digging rather than
pruning, and producing a dug garden rather than a pile of soil.
Al1 of the causes in a per se series differ fiom one another with respect to their
essence: man, the spade, etc., are al1 different in nature. This difference of essence
reflects the need for the series, for if they did not differ, there would be no need for
more than one cause. This difference is so vital that if one of the per se causes in a
series were removed, the rest would be powerless to produce the particular effect of
the series. Now, even though each per se cause of a series differs from t h e others,
they al1 resemble the effect, that is, they al1 give the effect its essence because they
al1 comprise the essential determinant of the causal activity which produced the
effect.
All commentators of the Second Way seem not to have difficulty seeing what we
have pointed out so far about the series of causes, although they may wish to express
it differently. Frederick Copleston's explanation of causal activity may perhaps be
seen in line with our explanation so far. But very few commentators unpack the first
proposition further and in such a way that it is clear how St. Thomas connects it to
the second proposition, and how he sees the third following from both of them, and
what exactly it means.
Let us, then, further unpack the meaning of the senes of per se causes. That is, let
us again think deeper about efficient causality under the light of the principles of
proper and final causality (under the essential and existential determinant of causal
activity). Let us see the implications these principles have on efficiency as we did
with motion.
The point that escapes many a cornmentator is that the whole series is
predisposed to producing actually the effect it produces rather than another effect.
It is not enough that the series have the essential determinant because that only
provides the ability to produce the effect, it does not provide the actual producing of
the effect. To put the matter poetically: the essence says I can, but not I wilL Thus
even though the whole series is responsible for the essential determinant of the
causal activity, the instrumental causes are not responsible for the existential
determinant; only the principal cause is responsible for that. In our example, the
gardener is only partly responsible for the garden being dug up in the way that is
conducive for a good growth of his tomato plants, rather than there being a pile of
soi1 (the other causes in the series are also necessary for the production of the dug
up garden). But the gardener is entirely responsible for the particular effect actually
being the effect it is rather than a different effect. As Smith puts it, "the
particularity of the job which instruments perform is due to its particularization by
the principal cause [which] also stiffens into their operational existence the activity
of the instr~ments.""~
Clearly. then, efficient causality cannot do without final causality. This is not to
identify the two, for the Second Way is "from the nature of the efficient cause" not
the final cause. But we are pointing out that the actual causing of the efficient
causes cannot be explained solely in terms of efficiency. That is to Say, we need to
account for why efficiency is here and now actually exercising itself rather than

Smith, Natural Theology., p. 117. This is a point that is missing in Copleston's account of the
hierarchy of efficient causes in the Second Way. In his account the crucial difference between the
instrumental and the principal cause, the difference that points out the hierarchy which Ieads to the
First Cause, is absent. I t is absent, I think, because his account is far to cosmological and not nearly
enough rnetaphysical.
remaining still. St. Thomas makes this point when he says, "for the end [the
tendency (conscious or not) of the agent] is a cause in so rnuch as it moves the
efficient cause to act; and so just as it has the nature [ratio]of a mover, it pertains in
a way to the genus of efficient cause.""'
But not every efficient causal activity is like our example of the gardener, that is,
not every series consists in a mixture of instrumental and principal causes. Our
example of the tomato becoming red is one where al1 the causes are principal: Sun,
soil, water, etc.. are principal causes of the tomato turning red. In this case the effect
is not brought about by the instrumentality of the causes, but by the essential
determination of the causal action of a11 the causes. In both cases, however, the
causes are causing, although somewhat differently.
This brings out the precise point to be ex~lainedby the Second Way: the fact
that there is actually, in existence, a cause whose actuality as a cause here and now
needs explaining. In the First Way we had beings as patients. or recipients of causal
action, here we have beings as agents, or doers of causal action. The patients are
becoming something, while agents are causing another to become something. We
could, of course, point out again the narrow window of being where the agent
becomes active before it is active, but that is more like the data of the First Way
rather than the Second." It is also true, for example, that the gardener's spade
insofar as it is being used is not a patient the way the garden is a patient as it is
being dug, and yet the spade is a recipient of the gardener's causal action. For the

"' St. Thomas Aquinas. In Libmrn De Causis Erpositio, lect. 1, prop. K39, (Rome: Maretti Editori
Ltd.. 1955). p. 7. (My translation.)
462
Perhaps the following point can make the data of the Second W a y clearer. Consider Aristotle's
maxim: every thing in motion is necessarily being moved by some other thing. The data of t h e First
W a y is a thing in motion, the data of the Second is some other thing. But in both cases the data may be
gleaned from the same instance of change or motion. The difference in t h e Ways is t h e different
subjects on which the metaphysician is focusing: either the subject of change or the subject causing
change. But both subjects are subjects of to be, of the act of existing.
sake of clarity we shall not cal1 such things patients but instruments of a principal
agent. We are here concerned with the causes causing, or agents as agents, which
insofar as they are acting are not in any way being changed or rnoved but are
producing change in another.
An agent as an agent, which is called a principal agent (and differs from a patient
and an instrument of a principal agent) possesses within itself the power by which it
produces an effect essentially like itself. For example, the light of the sunlight gives
the tomato its red colour. The power by which instruments of the principal agent
produce the effect is not entirely their own; that power is partly their own and
partly the power of the principal agent. In other words, instrumental causes do their
causing not entirely of their own act, but partly by the act of the principal agent.
This raises a question. Are the causal acts of the principal agents entirely their
own acts? Again, as we have seen in the First Way, the question is really asking
whether the principal agents are identically the power of their agency. It is tme that
they possess their causal power permanently, the way instrumental causes do not.
But the question is: do they in any way owe their own permanent act of causing to
another; are they themselves in any way caused with respect to the power of their
act of causing? We may put the question another way: do the principal causes
possess of their own essence their causal power; does the ultimate reason why their
efficiency "up and causes" lie within their very natures?
With this question we are clarifying the link between the first and the second
propositions of the Second Way. The second proposition says that an order or a
series of efficient causes is such that it requires the first efficient cause. Why does it
require it? First of all, every principal agent is not identically its act of causing.
Sornetimes it does not cause and sometimes it does; the gardener and his spade are
not always gardening; the man is not identically the gardener. Therefore, we ask this
question: Given that the gardener and his spade do not by themselves explain why
they dig a garden when they do, there must be a reason outside of them why they
actually do dig when they dig. What is that reason which is the cause of their actual
cau~ing?~
Again, no natural science can give us the answer. Why? Because natural sciences
deal with causes that are themselves not identically their own causal activity; they
are causes that sometimes cause and sometimes d o not and we still need an
explanation of why they do cause when they actually cause. Natural science can cnly
tell us what the causal power of a cause is like; it can describe it. But even if the
description be much more accurate than Aristotle's and St. Thomas', it will not help
us in answering why the power is being exercised here and now. Nor will it do to
postpone the answer by offering as the reason another cause which has the actual
exercise of its causing a principal agent's causing caused. In other words, infinite
regress is again both irrelevant and impossible.
Consider St. Thomas' argument. I t is impossible that anything should be its own
efficient cause, because that would mean that it would have to be and not-be a t the
same time which is impossible. I t would have to exist, if it is to be a cause, before it
is an effect. But, we may Say, that is clear enough when it comes to causing its own
existence, but the matter may be different with the causing of one's own causing. To
Say this, however, would be t o make again Kenny's oversight we encountered in the
reading of the First Way. The reason is this: if something is the causz of its own
causing, i t must be the cause of itself. We must see this better! To be causing is t o be
in the act of causing, and to cause its own causing is t o cause its own act of causing,
which means that a thing in causing its own act of causing must be in the act of

Note that we are not asking about that intervd in the being of an agent before it receives the
causal power and after it has received it. We are talking about the cause causing while permanently
possessing the power of causing. But we are noticing that this possession of the power, although
permanent, does not account for the actualexercise of it, that is, there is nothing in that power that
explains why it is being used. The 1can does not explain the I do.
causing before it causes it. Now this lands us in the same impossible predicament as
the scenario of causing one's existence, namely the scenario where that which is
caused must pre-exist itself, or, as Holloway puts it, "the same efficient cause could
not a t the same time both give and receive the power of c a u ~ i n g . "Therefore,
~
causal acts can only cause effects but not themselves nor their own permanent act of
causing. But if a causal act of a being is not identically that being (even though its
possession of that act is permanent), its causal act must be caused by another which
must be uncaused, if we are t o reach an explanation of the causal activity that is
going on here and now on this actual effect.
Given, then, the necessity of the uncaused cause which we have just shown, this
cause, says Smith, rnust have as its effect "such a juncture of the act of causing to
some principal agent as will allow the agent, now constituted in its act of causing, to
be the immediate cause, not of its causing [which is impossible because that agent is
not identically its act of causing] but of the effect of its c a u ~ i n g . What
" ~ ~ Smith
means, 1 think, is that the uncaused cause in causing a principal agent to exercise its
own proper causal activity does not thereby imrnediately cause the effect which that
agent causes. In other words, the uncaused cause does not dig the garden with the
gardener the way the gardener digs i t with a spade. The uncaused cause only causes
the agent to cause, and nothing more (although, as we shall see, that is plenty).
Recall the question that steered us in the right direction of explaining the precise
data of the Second Way which is causes causing. Given that the gardener and his
spade do not by themselves explain why they dig a garden when they do, there must
be a reason outside of them why they a c t u a h do dig when they dig. What is that
reason or the cause of their actual causing without which there would not be the
effect? The question is not why is the garden dug up, because we know the answer:

Holloway, op. nt.,p. 100.

srnith, Naturd Theology., p. 122.
the gardener digging with a spade. The question is, Why is that activity going on
here and now? and the answer is the uncamed
With this we have touched the third proposition which is the conclusion. Now,
in positing the answer to an actually present need for an uncaused cause, we have
posited the existence of that cause because actuality for St. Thomas is not an essence
but existence. But at this point we only have the existence of that "to which al1 give
the name God," and we do not yet know why they give it that name. The point
needs insistence. In knowing that a principal agent is not identically its causal
power, and in knowing that it is in fact here and now exercising its causal power, we
know that here and now it is being caused to cause rather than not to by an
uncaused cause. But our knowledge of the existence of the uncaused cause is at this
point still inseparable from its act of causing the exercise of the principal agent's
causal power which we see being exercised, that is, our knowledge of the existence
of the uncaused or first cause is dependent on that which is not the first cause. We
do not, however, want to Say that the first cause is so qualified by his act of causing
that he exists because he is causing and would not exist if he were not causing. For if
that were the case, he would not be the first or uncaused cause but would have his
existence dependent or caused on his own act of causing, which, as we saw above, is
a contradiction. But how do we make the separation known to ourselves? For us, to

4ESee In II Metaph., lec. 3, n. 302-304, and ST,1, q. 46, a. 2, ad 7 in connection with the Second Way.
W e should a t this point consider a Kantian objection. Kant argues that a11 beings in the redm of
phenomena are contingent, that is, they al1 have a cause. But cause is one of twelve categories and as
such can only be appiied to phenomena. The principle of causality is valid only within the realm of
sense-experience. Any attempt t o apply the principle beyond that realrn to reach an uncaused or a
necessary cause is neither possible nor logicd.
Holloway responds to this objection according to the philosophy of St. Thomas: "The principle
of causality does not have its origin in sensibIe beings insofar as they are sensible, but insofar as they
are or exist. Thus this principle is founded in being as such and its application is valid beyond mere
sensible being. Moreover, aithough this principle originates from contingent beings, there is in these
beings some necessity; namely, these contingent beings have a necessay relation to a cause.
Therefore, by applying this principle of causality, we are able to posit ...a first cause." HoHoway, op.
cit.,p. 99.
know a being is always to know it as belonging t o certain categores and as not
belonging to others, or as actually being something and potentially being something
else. So, how can we who know things this way corne to know the one whose
existence does not depend on the relation in which we know him, that is, how do we
apply "causing" to him in a "more excellent way" where his causing is truly
uncaused? The answer is this: we shall know God as radically different from
everything that belongs to some category of being, when we know that which is not
a category of being but which belongs to al1 beings regardless of which category of
being they are in. That something is the act of existing.
We have already encountered that act, but we had no occasion to mention it.
Let us do so now. W e encountered the act of existing when we encountered the
principal agent (the gardener) actually exercising his causal power of digging. In
encountering an agent of efficient causality we encountered a subject, which is to
Say an existent. Thus what the first or uncaused cause causes when it causes the
causing of an agent is an agent existing as causing. At this point we simply repeat the
question we raised with respect to the actual exercise of the principal agent's act of
causing: What is the cause of an agent existing as causing? W e know the uncaused
cause is the cause of its causing. But can that sarne cause while causing the causal
activity of a principal agent take for granted its existence? The answer is a
resounding m. The reason for the answer becomes immediately clear when we shik
that narrow window of being, through which we peeked in the First Way, to the
data of the Second Way. When we do, we see that the actual subject which is being
caused to exercise its act of causing exists precisely as exercising its causal act. This
means that the first cause is causing it not only to exercise its causal power but also
to exist, because the agent's exercise of its causal power and its existence at the
interval in which it is in fact exercising its power are in reality inseparable (they can
be abstracted only conceptually in al1 cases of composites of essence and existence,
as we saw in chapter seven). But if they are inseparable, the first cause cannot take
for granted the existence of the agent while it is causing the agent's exercise of its
causd power, but must cause it (for if not, it is not a cause of an actuaz agent).
Therefore, the First Efficient Cause really is that to which al1 give the name God
because he is God. W e can Say this now because we have taken God out of the
category of "causing the exercise of efficiency of efficient causes" and see him to be
the cause of the act of existence of the efficient cause exiiting as catrsing. Because we
now know the First Efficient Cause this way, we no longer have to Say that we know
the existence of that cause as inseparable from his act of causing. We can now Say
that we know him as the First Cause of any efficient cause existing as causing, and
the knowiedge of the first uncatcsed cause of the existence of an efficient came's
cawing makes his existence, as known by us, independent of any category of being.

As the First Cause of the act of existing he is identically that act, as every first cause
of some act is identicaliy that act because that is what it means to Say that it is the
f int."
And so, once more, we have demonstrated God's existence by way of causality. If
at this point we wish to go on and ask what is that whose existence we have
demonstrated, we are asking what is the First Cause or, according to St. Thomas,
what is the act of existing in itself. And to that question al1 medieval philosophers
responded, each in his own way, by following the unknown author of the The Book
of Causes who says:
The First Cause is above al1 description. And tongues fail to describe it only because they are
unable to describe its being, since the First Cause is above every cause and is described only
through the second causes that are illuminated by the Iight of the First Cause. This is because
the First Cause does not cease illuminating its effect but is not itself illuminated by any other
light, because it is pure light above which there is no light?

167
See ST,1, q. 3, a. 4.
" X e Book of C a w , trans. by Dennis J. Brand, (Niagara University Press, 1981). pp. 19-20.
The Third Way
The Third Way also takes its starting point from a fact of experience, although
not from the experience of passivity and activity of existent things, but of the
experience of the generation and corruption of beings. Our task here is to reflect
philosophically (in the proper sense of t hat word, which is to Say metaphysically) on
the beings' going in and out of existence. The reason, I think, why St. Thomas does
not present the argument of the Third Way first is tliat its data is not as
immediately apparent to us as the data of the first two Ways; it requires a more
penetrating reflection. But it is easier to see in the Third Way why the being to
which we conclude through the argument is indeed that which al1 men cal1 God, or
Ipsurn esse. It is perhaps understandable how one might mistake the first two Ways
forphysical proofs, that is, proofs tightly enmeshed in the science of cosmology. But
how someone can continue reading, if he is reading very carefully, the next three
Ways in the cosmological context is most puzzling.
The argument of the Third Way may be translated this way:
The third way is taken from the possible and the necessary, and it is as follows. W e find among
things those which are possible t o be and not to be, since they are found generated and
corrupted, and consequently able to be and not to be. It is impossible, however, that al1 which are
such always exist, because that which is possible not to be at some time is not. If, therefore, al1
things are possible not to be, a t one time there was nothing. But if this is true there would be
nothing even now, because that which is n o t does not begin to be except through sornething that
is. If, therefore, nothing was existing, i t was impossible that something began t o be, and in this
way nothing would be, which is openly false. Therefore, not al1 beings are possible, but it must be
that something among things exists necessarily. However, every necessary thing either has the
cause of its necessity from another o r it does not. But i t is not possible t o proceed t o infinity in
necessary things which have the cause of their necessity, just as i t is n o t possibIe in efficient
causes, as was proved. Therefore, it is necessary to posit something whose necessity is through
itself not having the cause of its necessity through a n o t h e ~ ,but which is t h e cause of the
necessity of others. This al1 say t o be ~ o d . ~ *

The argument consists in four propositions. 1) Arnong things in the world we find
those for which i t is possible both to be and not to be, and we find this because they
are generated and corrupted. 2) Among things that are, not al1 can be possible

4 s i ~ e ealso ST, 1, q. 19, a. 8; SCG,1, 15; II, 15.

(generated and corrupted); there must be something that exists necessarily. 3)
Every necessary thing either has the cause of its necessity fiom another or it does
not. 4) Therefore there exists that whose necessity is through itself, a necessary
being par excellence whom al1 Say to be God.
The immediate point to note about the first proposition is that it concerns the
things that are at present in the world and not the things that may be in the future.
We are not talking about the next year's crop of tomatoes, but about the tomatoes
that are in the garden right now. It is about these that we notice that they do exist
but need not exist, or, that their actual existence does not arise from themselves.
The data of the Third Way is things that are generated and therefore corruptible
(not those that can be generated and corrupted), and because they are both these
things, they possess the ability to be and not to be.
In the first two ways ive sought the cause not only of that which is changing and
that which is causing something else to change, but also of that which exists as
changing and that which exists as causing something else to change. In other words,
we had to seek the first cause of a category of being and of being itself, or the act of
existing. Here we go straight to the cause of being or the existence of things whose
existence we judge to be contingent (existence which is not of itself but is caused).
An interpretation of this data does not require, in order to be understood, anything
fiom medieval physics.
The point of the data, which is contingent existents, that we must see is the
point of the reception of the act of existing which occurs when a contingent existent
is generated and loses it when i t is corrupted. We must see that the subject of the
contingent act of existence becomes such a subject precisely because it receives this
act and did not in any way actually possess it before it received it. Note that this is
indeed the most special instance of reception. In every other instance it is possible to
speak of a subject as already actual before it receives whatever it receives" But it is
not so here where the reception constitutes the subject's coming into existence.
Note also that in speaking about a possible being we are not speaking about that
which receives an essence; we are not saying that what brings it into being is that it
became this or that kind of thing. In other words, a possible being is not a subject of
an essence but of existence. Thus, what makes a possible being possible is that it did
not at one time exist and it did corne into existence, and while it exists it has the
potency not to be. The narrow window of being this time is that ontological interval
at which a being cornes into existence, the point at which its potentiality for
existence is actualised (as opposed to a potentiality to receive or to impart on
another this or that form).
We can now consider the second proposition whose point shows most clearly the
radical difference between the act of existing and everything else. When St. Thomas
says that there must be something that exists necessarily, he is not saying that there
must be a thing of this or that kind whose act of existing is not received; he is saying
that there must be that which is identically the act of existing.
In order to see why there must be that which is, and not only has, the act of
existing, let us unpack St. Thomas' claim that not every being can be such that it is
possible for i t to be because it is generated and corrupted. In other words, we want
to see why it is that the possible (able not to be) at some time is not, and tLat
therefore, if al1 things are possible not to be, at one tirne there was nothing. Smith
explains the point this way:

One may at this point wish to object and Say, "1s it not the form which makes a thing be?" It is
t m e that a form makes a thing to be thk or that kind of thing (the form actualises it as a this), but it is
the act of existence that makes this or that kind of thing be. To deny that St. Thomas holds this is to
have to explain away a text like this: "Therefore whatever is the cause of things considered as beings,
must be the cause of things, not only according as they are such by accidental forms, nor according as
they are these by substantial forms, but also according to al1 that belongs to their 5eing a t al1 in any
way." ST, 1, q.44, a. 2.
 If an antecedent subject of a present act of existing did not exist by any previous act of existing,
obviously it would not have existed a t all; and if no antecedent subject of the present act of
existing existed at dl,before their present existence t here was a time when nothing existed. But if
once there was nothing, there would be nothing now, because from nothing there cornes nothing.
Clearly, then, since there are presently existent things, some antecedent subject of a present act
of existing must have existed before this present [act of existing]. To Say this is to Say that some
being is necessary*'
In other words, a possible being (existent) is one that can both be and not be
(exist and not exist). But if the cornplete set of al1 existents were possible, were able
both to exist and not to exist, nothing would come into existence, because from the
merely possible there could never come the actual-the possible does not have in
itself what it takes to actualise, either itself or anything else. But as a matter of
experience we know that beings that are able to exist and not to exist beings do
exist here and now. It follows that not al1 existents can be existents that are able to
exist and not to exist, but there must be a necessary existent whose necessity is such
that it sets it apart from al1 other beings.
1 find it helpful to see this point by considering more closely the special act of
receiving existence. Because to receive existence is identically to become the subject
of the act of existing, the set of subjects of the act of existing cannot be made up
entirely of possible beings or receivers of the act of existing. Such a set could never
be because it is made up entirely of receivers, which is to Say becomers, which did
not receive or become anything, and they did not receive or become anything
because there is no being that gives or is. Therefore, the set must include a giver or a
non-becomer, which is to Say a necessary being. It is most clear here why a regress is
completely irrelevant.
The moment we ask about the source of the necessity of the necessary being,
which brings us to the third proposition, we come to see that it cannot lie outside
the necessary being. That it cannot so lie is clear from the specialty of receiving and

-- - - --

mi Smith, Natural Theology., p. 126- 127.

possessing unreceived this the most special of things, namely the act of existing. The
reason why the giver (or the cause) of the act of existing could not himself have
received it is that he would not then be the giver. This is so because in this case the
giver is identically the non-becomer. If the giver were a becomer he would be a
receiver, and we would still need to account for the giver preceding that receiver.
Again, regress here is just as irrelevant as it was in the first two Ways because it
postpones our accounting for the giver.
Keeping in mind that the giving of existence is an act of the one who has it
without having received it, we see that the giver is identically being or existence
itself (Ipsum esse). Now this is in fact what everyone calls God because there is only
one such and he is radically different from al1 others, and in no way dependent on
them.
Interpreters like Henri Renard see the Third Way as offered within the context
of the hypothesis of an eternal world. Such a hypothesis is open to anyone that
denies the existence of God. In the context of the hypothesis of an eternity of
successive changes, al1 possibilities eventualiy occur. This includes the cormption of
what is able to be corrupted because such a being has a potency for ceasing to exist.
For if the world is eternal, generation and corruption have been taking place in it in
an infinite duration of time. But if the world consisted exclusively in corruptible
beings, that is, if everything possessed the potency to go out of existence, then in the
course of an infinitem time this potency to non-existence in everything would occur
leaving nothing in being. According to such a scenario, al1 beings would have a t one

It sseems that the hypothesis of an eternal world is really a hypothesis of an infinite world; that is,
i n f i n i s and eternity seern to be used interchangeably here. But according to the most famous
medieval definition of eternity, that of Boethius, eternity contains infinity and is not one and the
same with it, because infinity suggests motion and duration whereas eternity suggests rest and
containment: "eternity is the whole, simultaneous and perfect possession of an infinite life." The
Consolation of Philosophy, Bk. VI, (Harvard University Press: Loeb Classical Library, 1973). My
translation.
time ceased to exist, and nothing would now exist, which means that nothing would
ever become because from nothing cornes only nothing. Against the fact, for
something does in fact exist now. Therefore, there must exist some incorruptible or
necessary being.
Renard suggests the following syllogisrn for the above argument:

If ail existing beings were corruptible, in the supposition that this world is eternai, at a given
moment everything would cease t o be and nothing would exist today.
But the conclusion is faise.
Therefore, the antecedent must be faise. ConsequentIy, we must posit a necessary being whose
necessity does not de3end u w n anotherk"

Maurice Holloway, on the other hand, thinks that any difficulty we may have
with this argument (many interpreters have pointed out difficulties) would go away
if we read it in the following context.

It is impossible that there should be in existence only corruptible beings ...not because they had
al1 gone out of existence, but because they could never have existed in the first place. If we
suppose a moment at which only corruptible things existed, at that very moment nothing would
be existing. In other words, the supposition is quite impossible. For by supposition we would
have beings which qua corruptible need a cause why they do not conupt and at the sarne time do
not have that cause, since by supposition only corruptible beings are existing. But since de facto
corruptibIe beings do exist, it folIows that here and now there must aiso be existing other beings
that are incorruptible."74
In other words, to Say that only corruptible beings exist is to Say that what exists
is only that which receives existence, that is, what exists is only that which does not
have existence of itself and is therefore in potency to losing it (is able not to be). If
everything is a receiver with respect to existence, if there is no giver of existence
that is itself not a receiver, then nothing exists, because receivers without a giver
cannot be said to have received.
The difficulty 1have with Renard's understanding of the argument is that in St.
Thomas' words, the situation is not that nothing would exist because sooner or later

Renard, n i e Philosophy of God, pp. 39-40.

Hololway, op. cit.,pp. 115-116.
al1 corruptible beings would cease t o be, but rather nothing would exist because
nothing would have begun to exist in a world of only corruptible beings.
But if this is true there would be nothing even now, because that which is not does not begin to
be except through something that is. If, therefore, nothing was existing, i t was impossible that
sornething began to be, and in this way nothing would be, which is openly faise.
That is, the reason why something exists now is that it began to exist, and it could
only have begun to exist through something that already exists. Now the world
cannot consist exclusively in a set of beings that began to exist, even going back
infinitely, because their existence is not in and of themselves, that is, they are
distinct from their existence and, therefore, must have received it, which we know
because we see thern going in and out of it. Thus even a world of receivers stretching
back infinitely requires a giver. This giver is a necessary being whose necessity is
that of a being that does not only have the act of existence, but is that act." This
being is God.
In light of this, we can restate Renard's syllogism whose premises must
understood metaphysically (not merely logically):
If al1 existing beings were corruptible, (if they al1 received existence and as distinct fmm their
existence are in potency to Iosing it), in the supposition that this world is eternd, then nothing
began to exist and nothing would exist today.
But the conclusion is false.
Therefore, the antecedent must be false. Consequently, we must posit a necessary being whose
necessity is such that he in no way depends upon another. This being is one that everyone
understands to be God.

The Fourth Way

The argument of the Fourth Way presupposes a familiarity with a principle we
have not yet explicitly considered. I t is the principle of participation, ais0 referred
to as the principle of exemplarity. St. Thomas expresses this principle in different
ways.

For various kinds of necessity of being that belong to creatures and not to God see SCG,II, 30.
 Whenever something is found to be in several things by participation in various degrees, it must
be derived by those in which it exists imperfectly from that one in which i t exists most perfectly:
because where there are positive degrees of a thing so that we ascribe it to this one more and to
that one l e s , this is in reference to one thing to which they approach, one nearer than another:
for if each one were of itself competent to have it, there would be no reason why one should have
it more than a n ~ t h e r . ~ ~

For what is such by participation, and what is mobile, and what is imperfect always requires the
pre-existence of something essentially such, immovable and perfect.m

The principle of participation may accordingly be formulated this way: "Euery

limited perfection of the e-ristent s a participation of the absolute wihich must erist.""
It is clear that this principle does not reveal the self-evident and necessary tmth
of the existence of an absolute being. It is a principle that is rooted entirely in
participated beings. St. Thomas sees no need to try to establish the participation of
things. It is enough to note that what things have as part of their essence they are
not identically that, but more o r less have it. This degree of possession implies a
perfection, "something essentially such" which does not possess only a degree of that
essence but possesses it perfectly, which is to Say that it is essence because that is
what a perfect possession means.
But it is important to note that the reason why a proper cause is called for in
reference to participated beings is not the fact that they are participated beings but
the fact that they exist as participants of some essence. To deny this is to get tangled
up again in the insoluble difficulties of essentialism with respect t o the problem of
the one and the many. It is also to miss the point of what precisely is needed when a
proof of the existence of a cause is needed.

Why are there participated beings? To answer the question by saying: there are participated
beings because they are caused, and therefore there exists a cause of such things, is true enough.
Nevertheless that answer does not fully reveal the existence of God unless and until it is seen

. - .-

m 6 ~ Thomas
t. Aquinas, De Pot., q. III, a. 5, ed. cit.
477
ST, 1, q. 79, a. 4.
Renard, The Philosophy of Gd.,p. 42.
 that nothing short of a cause of d e n c e will account for the existence of that whose existence is
caused.479
Let us therefore t u m to yet another way of reaching the cause of existence. St.
Thomas states his argument this way:

The fourth way is taken from the gradations which are found in things. For among things some
are found more and less good, true, noble, and in the sarne way concerning others. But "more" or
"lessn is said of different things according as they approach in different ways to that which is the
maximum; just as a thing is more hot the more it approaches that which is most hot- Therefore,
there is something which is truest, best, noblest, and consequentIy being in the highest degree;
for those things which are the truest are being in the highest degree, as is said in book II of
Met~physics~ But that is said to be the greatest in some gentcs which is the cause of all things which
are in that genus,just so fire which is the rnost hot is the cause of al1 hot things, as is said in the
same book. Therefore, there is something which is the cause of being and goodness and of
whatever other perfection is in al1 things, and this we cal1 ~ o d . ~
The argument rnay be divided into three propositions. 1) Among things some are
found more and less good, true, noble, and so on. 2) The things which are more or
less some perfection approach that perfection in its highest degree and are caused by
it with respect to that perfection. 3) Therefore, there is something which is the
cause of being and goodness and of al1 other perfections, which we cal1 God.
As in the first three Ways, the first proposition reveals the data of the Way. In
this case the data is transcendental perfections, or perfections that are possessed by
different things in differing gradations. The data of the fourth way is not a
perfection like humanity, animality, and others which are not transcendental. In
other words, the data is not the perfections that belong only to some beings. The
data is those perfections which are predicated of every being (of al1 that is but need
not be), and which every being possess to a degree (it is not important for the
present purpose to determine how much a being possess a transcendental
perfections). The transcendental perfection with which the Fourth Way is
particularly concerned is the first of them, namely being. This may be contested on
the grounds that it is never explicitly stated by St. Thomas in the Fourth Way. But

mSmith, Naturnl nteology., p. 83.

480
ST, 1, q. 2, a. 3. See a h ST, 1, q. 44, a. 1;1, q. 65, a. 1; SCG, 1, 13; I,28; II, 15; De Ver., q. XXII, a. 2.
the medieval readers of the Summa will have been well acquainted with the
following point. That we are not so acquainted is irrelevant.
Now, as Avicenna says, that which the intellect first conceives as, in a way, the most evident, and
to which it reciuces al1 its concepts, is being. Consequentty, al1 the other conceptions of the
intellect are had by additions to being. But nothing can be added to being as though i t were
somethiog not ineluded in being ...for every reality is essentially a beingT1

Furtherrnore, in the argument itself, we see this staternent, "Therefore, there is

sornething which is truest, best, noblest, and consequently being in the highest
degree." It seems, then, that for St. Thomas al1 transcendental perfections culminate
in the first transcendental-being. We shall therefore read the Fourth Way in light
of it.
In fact the second proposition read in light of beng rather than through any
other transcendental leads most quickly to the conclusion; the others lead to it as
well, but the road is a bit longer. The truth of the first part of the second proposition
can be seen in light of the following point. The fact that there are grades of
transcendental perfections in beings means that none of them, insofar as they
possess only a grade of a perfection, possess it fully. Now it requires some
metaphysical thinking in order to see exactly why some beings have more being than
others; it requires some thinking about their natures (particularly, about their
forms) which would show that, for exarnple, a man has more being than a cat, and a
cat has more being than a tulip, because the nature of the first is more truly being.
than the nature of the second, and so on. But even if, under the influence of Hindu
thought, we want to insist that man, cat, and tulip al1 possess being to the same
degree, we must still admit that none of them possesses it fully, that is, that none of
them is identically being. Therefore, however much they possess the perfection of
being, they still only approximate that perfection and do not exhaust it. For if any of
them did exhaust it, the cat for example, to be would then mean to be cat. But there

@'De Ver.,q. Il a 1.
is in fact also tulip and man, therefore to be cannot mean to be identically neither
cat,nor fulip, nor man.
If, then, none of them is identically being,they must be recipients of being, which
is to Say that their being is caused or owed to another, and that is what the second
part of the second proposition states. Al1 that remains is to inquire into this cause,
which brings us to the conclusion.
In the technical language of scholastic philosophy the cause in question here is
called the exemplar cause. It is not really a new cause, that is, not a cause added to
the four fundamental causes, but an aspect of the efficient c a u ~ eThe
. ~ function of
an exemplar cause is to make its effect the E n d that it is, which gives the effect its
intelligible contour or likeness, and an exemplar does this in one of two ways: by its
nature and/or by its knowledge.

The form of anyt hing existing apart from the thing itself can be for one of two ends; either t o be
the type of that of which it is cdled the form, or to be the principle of the knowledge of that
thing, inasmuch as the f o m s of things knowable are said to be in him who knows them. In either
case we must suppose ideas, as is clear for the following reason:
In al1 things not generated by chance, the form must be the end of any generation whatsoever.
But an agent does not act on account of the form, except insofar as the likeness of the form is in
the agent, as my happen in two ways. For in some agents the form of thing to be made pre-exists
according to its natural being, as in those that act by their nature; as a man generates a man, or
fire generates fire. Whereas in other agents (the form of the thing to be made pre-exists)

"Aristotle says this about the exemplar cause: "Indeed. it is cvident in some cases that that which
generates another is like that which is generated, not numerically one and the same but one in
species, as in natural generations; for a man begets a man, unless sornething is generated contrary to
nature, as for exarnple a mule by a horse ...So it is evident that there is no need ac a11 of setting up a
Form as a pattern (for we should have looked for such f o m s [or Foms] in physical substances above
all, since these are substances in the highest degree), but that which begets is sufficient to produce
and to be the cause of the form in the matter." Metaphzjsics, Book VII, ch. 8 1033b 30-1034a 5, (trans.
by H.G. Apostle). See also Aristotle's Physics, Book II, ch. 3, 194b 30.
St. Thomas agrees with Aristotte when he says, "The form of a thing can rnean that according to
which a thing is inforrned. This is the exempIary form in i m i t a t i ~ nof which a thing is made. Hence,
the idea of a thing is the form which a thing imitates... This, therefore, seems to constitute the
character of an idea: It must be a forrn which something imitates because of the intention of a n agent
who antecedently determines the end himself." De Ver., q. 1, a. 3, ed. cit. The last sentence points out
that St. Thomas' notion of exempIarity is not purely Platonic where the exemplar is the universai
idea or Form which is not an efficient cause of an imperfect individual instance of that idea. For St.
Thomas, the exemplar is the agent, Say God, who creates or efficiently causes a creature by willing
(intending) it to be. W e shall say more about this presently.
 according to intelligible being, as in those that act by intellect; and thus the likeness of a house
pre-exists in the mind of the builder. And this may be cdled the idea of the house, since cne
builder intends to build his house like to the f o m conceived in his mind. As when the world was
not made by chance, but by God acting by His intellect, there must exist in the divine mind a
form to the likeness of which the wodd was madem
W e said above that the data of the Fourth Way is gradated transcendental
perfections. This implies a point we must see. To Say that a perfection is gradated is
to Say that that there is that which is the standard or the exemplar according to
which the gradated is gradated. Now this standard and the gradated are related to
one another in a one-way relation, that is, the relation flows from the gradated to
the exemplar but not the other way round. The reason is the difference between a
transcendental perfection and the absolute and limitless perfection of the exemplar;
the perfectly good is radically different from the transcendentally good. Nothing is
added to or taken away from the perfection of the exemplar by the fact that
transcendental perfections approximate i t or flow from it, whereas it makes al1 the
difference to a transcendental perfection how much it approximates the exemplar-
the difference of its very essence and existence.
Therefore, if the gradated exists, the exemplar must also exist. We have just seen
that it rnust. The gradation we are speaking of is being. W e find that in different
things the possession of being varies, that is, none of them possesses it fully, or
exhausts it (for if any of them did, there could not be many of them, and there are in
fact many). The actual existence of exemplified being points to the actual existence
of the perfect exemplar.
At first glance this seerns like essentialism, and it does because we think of
examples and the exemplar as essences. We thus tend to think of things which
possess gradations of being as possessing gradations of a what. We even said that the
data of the Fourth Way is those perfections which are predicated of every being,

433
ST,1, q. 15, a. 1. The Fourth Way is therefore implicitly based on efficient causality because from
it flows the existence of transcendental perfections that we find in contingent existents.
and which every being possesses t o the degree that it does possess it. Now it seems
to us much easier to predicate essences than being, and when w e do predicate being
to a thing we are in fact pointing out a conceptual relation of being to that which
possesses being, and this is true of everything, including God. This necessary
conceptual relation is true even of things that do not yet exist but c m exist, like a
future child: we know that whatever else she will be, she will certainly be a being.
But we need not, as we saw in the second section of chapter five, remain at the Ievel
of conceptual relation of being (existence). That point may be summarised this way:
Once anything is known to exist [that is,once our hihire child is no longer only conceived of
but known as an existent], then the conceptual relation of being to its possessor stiffens into an
assertion of that relation of being to the given case, stiffens into the judgment, this thing is a being
or exists. Thus we move from a transcendental concept of being, which involves its inferiors
indeterminately, to a judgment which involves an inferior determinately. Here we have not a
concept of the reIation of being to an indeterminate inferior, but that relation given in fact and
our judgrnent upon that fact, this thing exiskm
Our knowledge, therefore, of beings whose existence is a transcendental perfection,
or gradated, is not a knowledge of a mere concept but of an actual existent existing
as gradated with respect to its act of existing. We therefore know that there are
grades of being because we know a gradated being.
But a gradated being which we know, and which we know as gradated cannot
exist unless there exists a being which is not gradated. We must here resist the
temptation to sink into mere conceptualism, for if we do, w e shall not have the
knowledge of the existence of the ungradated being, or the exemplar of being. It is
certainly true that our conception of a gradated being is closely tied up with an
indeterminate conception of the ungradated being. But to invoke this fact is not to
have a demonstration of God's existence. Many contemporary comoZogical
arguments formulated within the context of modern philosophical traditions amount
to no more than very reserved claims to a certainty of God's existence for the very

aiSmith, Naturd TheoZogzj., p. 133.

reason that they never make contact with anything real but remain inside a concept.
But the point is not how our concepts are related; the point is not the concept of
being. We shall not understand the Fourth Way unless we see that we cannot make
a judgment that there exists a gradated being unless we also make the judgment that
there exists the being on whose existence the existence of the gradated being
depends. In the Third Way we saw that contingent beings are receivers in a special
sense insofar as they receive their being which they must receive because they are
not identically their being. Here we note that contingent beings not only receive
their being, but receive a gradated share of it and of every other transcendental
perfection. Now because there exist beings which share something (to a greater or
lesser degree), there must also exist that which they share? But that which they
share cannot itself share or receive and at the same time be that which al1 other
beings share. This is most clearly and most immediately evident with the first
transcendental-being. Therefore, there exists the ungradated possessor of being,
which, as ungradated, is being itself and outside al1 categories of being." This we
rnay certainly cal1 God.

Note how different this point is frorn the following: Because we possess the concept of beings
which share something (to a greater or leser degree), we also possess the concept of that which they
share. This is certainly a true point, but it is not the point of the Fourth Way.
One possible objection to this is that we have al1 d o n g been supposing God, and so did not really
prove his existence. If the gradated is dependent upon the ungradated in order t o be intelligible, then
we must first grasp the ungradated before we can see that the gradated is gradated. This objection
will be raised only by them that deny that the principles of intellect are principles of being as well as
Iogic.
Holloway suggest we reply this way: "If one means that degrees of perfection are not intelligible
to us unless we first know the supreme degree, this must be denied. But if one means that these
degrees of perfection are not intelligible in themselves unIess some supreme degree exists, the
statement is true. I t is a fact that we have -knowledge of these degrees of perfection; hence, they are
intelligible to us. And the intellect also understands that in themselves these degrees would not be
intelligible unless there existed some supreme degree. Hence, for our intellect, the knowledge of this
supreme degree constitutes a necessary t e m . But in itself this supreme degree is the first cause of the
intelligibility of the other degrees and, indeed, of the very being of t h e graded perfections."
Holloway, op. d.,pp. 129-130,
 This argument will appear to us Platonic or essentialist only if we fail to see that
the idea of being is not being; we must see that being is not only conceptually
related to an existent, but "is detereminately related to an act of existing both in
itself and in our predicative knowledge of it."Q To see this we do not need
argument but open and uninhibited contact with actual existents. Perhaps the best
place to begin making contact with the act of existence of actual existents is our
very selves, because we are most reluctant to think of ourselves and to know
ourselves merely conceptually. This way we shall avoid attempting an essentialist or
ontological argument for the existence of anything, and place ourselves in a far
better position to understand that "there is no analysis of the concept of God in the
Fourth Way; there is only an affirmation of the existence of the perfect exemplar
from the known fact of the existence of the exemplar.""

The Fifth Way

The last Way is concerned with ends, or goals of natural agents as agents. The
causality that is involved here is final causality." The argument of the Fifth Way
presupposes an understanding of the principles of causality and finality which we
discussed in chapter six. It consists in three propositions that need not be restated
but only thoroughly unpacked:

Smith, Nah<ral Theology., p. 134.

"Renard. The Philosophy of God., p. 45.
*P9 But final causality is not separate frorn efficient causdity. "The efficient cause is the cause of the
final cause inasmuch as it makes the final cause be, because by causing motion the efficient cause
brings about the final cause. But the final cause is the cause of the efficient cause, not in the sense
that i t makes it bey but inasmuch i t is the reason for the causality of the efficient cause. For an
efficient cause is a cause inasmuch as i t acts, and i t acts only because of the final cause. Hence the
efficient cause derives its causality from the final cause." St. Thomas, In VMetaph., lect. 2, n. 775.
"The end is a cause only for as much as i t moves the efficient cause t o act, since i t cornes first not
in existence, but in the intention. Consequently, there is no action where there is no final cause." De
Pot., q. V, a. 1.
 The fifth way is taken from the direction [or governance, literally s t e d g ] of things. For we see
that some things that Iack intelligence, namely natural bodies, operate on account of an end, and
this is apparent from the fact that they always or frequently operate in the same way and they
obtain that which is best, therefore it is clear that they arrive at an end not by chance but by
intention. But those things that do not have intelligence do not tend toward an end unless
directed by another with knowledge and intelligence, like an arrow by an archer. Therefore,
there is an intelligent being by which al1 natural things are ordered to their end, and this we cal1
~ o d . ~

Again, the first proposition reveals the data from which we shall conclude to
God's existence. The first thing to note about it is that in saying that we see some
bodies acting for an end we are not saying that some bodies do not act for an end.
The point is that al1 bodies always tend to act for an end whether we see them acting
for an end or not. For example, al1 stones always tend to fall; they do not always fall.
The point is that they tend to act along definite lines, toward some definite
operation, like falling, and this definite operation is the goal o r end of their
tendency. Furthemore, they have this tendency before they actually do act; they
possess it in virtue of their nature which is a principle of their action, and
consequently is necessady ordered to its end.
That this is so we have already argued in the second section of chapter nine
when we discussed active potency, and the two sub-principles of the principle of
causality: the principle of proper causality-every agent produces its like, and the
principle of finality-every agent acts on account of an end. We can now transpose
the discussion to the question of acting for an end.
Every action, like every proper cause, possesses both essential and existential
determinants. Thus every action is a definite action, and never indefinite, that is, it
is a specific kind of action different from al1 other kinds of actions: a man
philosophises, a gopher digs, a humming bird hums. But a an agent's action will only
be a definite action (which is to Say that it will only be an action) if the agent is by
its nature predisposed to act in one way rather than another. In order that an action

See dso ST, 1, q. 18, a. 3; 1, q. 44, a. 4;SCG 1, 13; II, 23-24, III, 1-2;De Ver.,q. V, a. 1-2;De Pot., q.
III, a. 15; In Phys., II, lect. 4,7,8; In Metaph., XII, Iect. 9.
be a hurnmirig action which a bird does, it must be that the bird, before its action,
d l hum rather than crow because it is a humming bird rather than a crow that is
acting. This reveals the essential determinant of actions.
The existential determinant, on the other hand, ensures that an agent does in
fact act (in a definite or specific way) rather than not act. This reveals that in
addition to the preordination of the nature of an agent, there is in it an inclination
or a bent to act rather not to act in a definite way, which is an altogether different
preordination.
Now the essential and existential determinants within an agent must, before it
acts, be located in its knowledge and appetite or tendency. That it must be so
located needs explaining. In saying that things act for an end, we are saying that
they act in a defnite way; the end of activity is the specific nature of t h e activity.
Before an agent acts it is inclined toward the end of its act, which is a n act along
certain lines. But even though this is true (to deny this is to deny that there is an
activity, because an activity without a goal is an activity of no kind, and therefore
no activity a t all), it is also true that before a n action takes place there is no actual
goal of action, no actual definite lines of action. In the same way, although it is true
that an agent will not in fact act unless it is so inclined before it acts, an inclination
is not an act preceding the inclined act; there is no act before an act. It seems, then,
that before an action does in fact take place, there is neither an actual essential nor
an actual existential deterrninant. We shall not see the point of the fint proposition,
nor the point of the Fifth Way, if we deny the truth of both these seemingly
contradictory aspects of an action. The problem lies in presenring the first aspect
which we cannot deny if we affirm at the sarne time that there is an action. The only
way to preserve the reality of an end of action is to place it in knowledge and
appetite or tendency of the agent. The need t o do this becomes clear the moment we
note that t o be disposed toward an end demands knowledge of the end; a thing
c a m o t be disposed to something unknown. (We are not hereby saying that it must
be known by the agent. It may or may not be known by the agent, but it must be
known.)
In order to do this we must first distinguish between different modes of be-ing or
existing. Only two modes are possible: actual existence and cognitive or intentional
existence (existence in knowledge)?' An actual existent exists by reason of is or act
of existing, and an intentional existent exists by reason of is k n o ~ e n z more
;~
technically, the act of physical being is esse, the act of intentional being is esse
intentionale.
We must not, however, think of physical and intentional being as two subjects of
the act of existing, as two existents. Recall our discussion of the knowledge of the
act of existing in chapter seven. There we philosophically unpacked that which is. If
we now consider that mhich is or is known, we shall see the proper place of
intentional being. The subject of existence is that which. Existence affects that which
in two ways: it affects the physical subject of that which exists or can exist by the
physical being (esse), and the intentional subject of that which is known to exist or
known to be able to exist by intentional being (esse).
Our difficulty in seeing the point of this is our tendency toward essentialism. If
we conceive of being as essence, we shall understand St. Thomas' talk of intentional

"' Scholastic philosophers distinguished between three different senses of intention: ethical, logical,
and metaphysical. In metaphysics intention means "the direction or application or causai power to an
effect; the influence of the principal cause on the instrument. This may be the principle meaning of
intention as it best shows the notion of directing o r tending on the part of a being or power."
Dictiona y of Scholastic Philosophg , p. 63.
St. Thomas distinguishes between two senses of intention in De Ver. "When the end is cailed prior
in intention, intention is taken as the act of the mind which is to intend. But when we compare the
intention of good [as in the Fifth Way] with that of the true, intention is taken as the essentiai
character which is signified by a definition." q. XXI, a. 3, ad 5-
For a discussion of the meaning and application of cognitional or intentional being, as weIl as of its
historical development, and modem objections to it, see Joseph Owens, An Elernentary Christian
Metaphysics, pp. 30-37.
being 3s an essence and, therefore, as a subject of being; we shall try to rnake of it a
subject of existence separate from the that which. For St. Thomas to be is not to be
known, and there is, therefore, a distinction between physical and intentional being.
For him to be known is a separate act of a that mhich from its act of physical esse;
both are acts of the same subject of existence, but in different ways. Furtherrnore,
whatever is actual and contingent was at one time potential. But what was its mode
of existing while potential? The answer is intentional mode, and it is tied up with
the nature of the human intellect.
Consider that the intellect, having been informed by the species of the thing, by an act of
understanding forms within itself a certain intention of the thing understood, that is to Say, its
notion, which the definition signifies. This is a necessary point, because the intellect understands
a present and an absent thing indifferently [hence our tendency toward essentialism]. In this the
imagination agrees with the intellect. But the intellect has this characteristic in addition,
namely, that it understands a thing as separated from rnaterial conditions, without which a thing
does not exist in reality [but does exist intentiondy]-m
Thus, because to be is not identically to be known, there are two realms: realm of
actual existing things and the realm of knowledge. Everything contingent both is
(has physical esse) and is k n o m (has intentional esse), and these are not identical.
St. Thomas, as a thorough existentialist, will not deny an act of existing to things in
the realm of knowledge where they are not actual but potential. The potential has
its own act; if it did not, it could not be known because it could not bel it would be
nothing. Therefore, it rnust have sume way of being, and that way is intentional.
Every something (a thing of intelligible species which is a subject of existence) is
also known. Therefore, that which is physically actual, is also intentionally actual or
else it could not be known, for it is not known in virtue of being physical, whereby it
is only what it is. Smith makes the point this way:
Once the fact that we know things is admitted, it then becornes apparent why we do. We know
things because the way they have of existing is by an act of being, an esse intentionale,by which
what is common to both knowledge and to things [the known] ... is known to be so comrnon [to
separate knowledge from the known things is to destroy knowledge as such, and t o posit in its
 place secollection or sornething else]. in short, grant that there is knowledge and you must grant
that the act of knowing and the act of being known must be oiie and the same act: the sensible in
its act of being sensed is sensation, and the intelligible in its act of being understood ir the very
act of understanding ...The whole function of intentional being is to make the knower the things
he knows without prejudice either to the knower's physical being or to the physical being of the
kn~wn.~
W e are now in a better position to understand the first proposition of the Fikh
Way which reveals its data. The end of every action (which is the specific nature of
an action) must reside in an agent's knowledge if there is to be an action at all,
because a determination toward an end demands knowledge and t o be an agent is to
be determined toward an end. As ive just saw, there are only two modes of being:
actual and intentional. What is the mode of the end of an action of an agent not
acting? The answer: intentional mode. Just as the act of knowing and the act of
being known are one by virtue of intentional being, so an agent is o n e with (or like)
the end of its nonexistent operation by virtue of the end's intentional being; an
agent is one with the end in its knowledge, for it is there that the end has its being in
absence of its actual being. To separate an agent from its knowledge of the end of its
nonexistent action is t o destroy his agency and to make him entirely passive, or a
non-agent.
The end must also reside or exist in an agent's appetite or tendency precisely
because an agent is an agent, that is, it is inclined to act, inclined t o being a final
cause. Now in absence of an actual final cause there still must be an intentional final
cause (because we have an agent, although an inoperative one), and there is: it exists
intentionally in the agent's appetite or tendency.

aiSmith, Naturai Theology., pp. 196-197.Many modern and contemporary philosophers will, of
course, disagree. But they will do so because for them to know does not mean t o know an actuai
thing that has its own act of existing. Note that many contemporary philosophers are more
cornfortable with using an expression like "justified or supported belief" t h a n they are with
knowledge. What is it they are afraid of? Epistemology is most certainly dependent on metaphysics
(philosophy of being). If our metaphysics is devoid of be-ing, it will be reduced to a mere shifting of
concepts that are not seen as directly tied up with actual existents. Metaphysicd knowledge will in
that case not amount to a knowledge of actually existing things, but will consist rnerely in solutions
to puales arising from "philosophizing" about mere concepts.
 We must conclude, then, that knowledge is a t the root of every action because
an action, whether actual or potential, must have some way of existing, and as an
action it is determined toward an end, which demands knowledge. Now, even
though the activity of some agents does not arise from their own knowledge
(because they do not have any), nevertheless it must corne from knowledge or else
there could be no intelligible connection between the agent and its specific
operation (that is, it would not be a specific operation at all, but an operation of no
kind; it would be nothing). The data of the Fifth Way is the role of knowledge in
every action; the role of that which rnakes the action what it is and knowable
(consisting in both the essential and existential deteminants). If this were not the
data, the only alternative would be the data of the Second Way, but the Theologian
is not repeating himself but is offering five different ways.
We must now consider different kinds of agents, some of which do not possess
knowledge. In his argument St. Thomas mentions only agents that do not have
knowledge. But in ST, 1, q. 18, a. 1-3we find a more detailed discussion of al1 natural
things. The discussion will shed more light on the Fifth Way. A brief summary of it
may be given.
First, instrumental agents, insofar as they are instrumental, have no knowledge
at all. Their activity is guided by the knowledge of principal agents (efficient
causes). Secondly, different kinds of agents are differently related to their actions.
Their different natures are responsible for the kind of activity they perform, for their
tendency to perform it, and for actually performing it rather than not to. Sometimes
natural activity of natural agents are hindered by unnatural occurrences, but that
does not affect the argument because we are dealing only with natural operations.
The first group of agents is the non-living, and these are the cause of neither their
performance of operations nor the execution of their performance. A rock, for
example, does not fa11 by its own causality (although it does perform the operation
of falling). The next group of agents is the living non-sentient. These cause only the
execution of their operations but not the kind of operation they perforrn. Plants, for
example, grow by t h e causality of their growth. Brute animals or living sentient
agents cause both the execution and to some degree the kind of their operations.
They are not, for example, the cause of some inactivity like not eating; when they
are not eating but are hungry that is never because they are fasting or on a hunger
strike. Finally, rational agents cause both the execution and the kind of their
operations to the degree that they act in a specific way or not act at al1 because their
knowledge distinguishes between the goods of both activity and inactivity. With
this we have sufficiently explained the first proposition and prepared the ground for
the second proposition.
The force of the second proposition is clearer now that we have so extensively
unpacked the first one, that is, now that we have seen that activity resides partly in
knowledge of the agent (which it must if there is to be a union between the nature
of the agent and its yet only potential operation), and that not al1 agents possess
knowledge. The reason why in the argument of the Fifth Way the Theologian
mentions only the agents that do not possess knowledge is that all agents are to
some degree inclined to their action non-cognitively. This is the first point to note
about the second proposition.
Currently in the West there is much talk about cosmic consciousness present in
al1 things; we can, we are told, be "in tune" with everything and everything can be
"in tune" with us via the sarne "energy" that is in al1 of us. According to this doctrine
everything in some way "thinks" or is cognitive. For the purposes of the Fifth Way
it is not necessary to argue that rocks cannot be in any way cognitive or that of al1
things on earth only human beings are strictly speaking cognitive. It is enough to
point out that no agent is identically its act of knowing (the mode of an agent's act
of knowing is irrelevant), and to that degree it is inclined to its action non-
cognitively. Now if no agent is identified with its acts of knowing, and there are in
fact here and now acts of knowing, there must be a first act of knowing.
The precise point of the Fifth Way, which is the second point to note about the
second proposition, will be grasped when we see that the cause of every action is the
first act of knowing. How can we see that? First, we must recall the argument of the
Second Way. There we proved the existence of an uncaused cause of agents existing
as causing change in another. Therefore, any action with which the Fifth Way is
concerned is an action of a cause whose causality is caused by the uncaused cause.
Now in the Fifth Way we see that the uncaused cause's act of causing is a cognitive
act, because the causal act of every agent that is not identically its own agency (and
to that extent is indined to its action non-cognitively) is inseparable from
knowledge (whether its own knowledge or the knowledge of another). Therefore,
the causing of the uncaused cause must be uncaused causal knowing.
This point is more easily seen when dealing with agents that do not possess
knowledge because their action cannot be traced to their knowledge, and the non-
cognitive character of their inclination to action is more evident. But there must be
knowledge which connects the agent with the specific character of its action prior
to the actual existence of that action. Therefore, this knowledge must be traced to
the uncaused causal act of knowing which causes the non-cognitive agent to exist as
deterrnined by knowledge, which is not their own, toward the end of its action. For
this reason the Theologian deals with such agents in his argument. But the point
applies also in the case of the action of an agent that does possess knowledge and
whose action can be traced to its knowledge. Even though cognitive agents possess
the knowledge wherein resides the intentional being of the ends of their actions,
they are not identically that knowledge, that is, their existence as knowing agents is
not due to their essences but is caused. If they did exist because they are a particular
essence of a knowing agent, to exist would mean to be that essence. But, clearly,
there are other essences, therefore, the cause of a knowing agent as a knowing agent
lies outside of it. Such a cause is itself either caused or not. If it is, it requires a cause.
We have, therefore, again the case of irrelevant infinite regress, and again the
uncaused cause. An uncaused cause of what? Of the sarne as in the case of entirely
non-cognitive agents, with one difference: the uncaused cause of the cognitive agent
existing as determined by knowledge that is its own (and this is the difference)
toward the end of its action.
The concluding proposition properly concludes to the existence of God precisely
because we have reached the act of the one whose uncaused causal knowbzg is
identically the knower (he is also identically the cause, but we already know that
from the Second Way). And he is identically the knower because he is the first
knowledge-cause of agents existing as determined toward an end by the knowledge
that may or may not be theirs. As the first his knowledge of the end is the
knowledge of himself because he is his own end (if he were not, he would not be the
first). Therefore, we can Say for the fifth time, God does exist.
Objections to this interpretation of the Fifth Way wiIl, of course, be many. Al1 of
them, again, will be in some way disconnected from the autonorny and suprernacy of
the act of existing in a creature, and, therefore will not see the autonomy and
supremacy of the first act of existing. Until the discussion about the Five Ways is
centered on God's actual existence, and the real possibility of our knowledge of that
existence on the basis of the act of existence of creatures, the issue between the
disputants will not be joined. But neither will it then be understood why St.
Thomas says that God is the proper cause of the act of being.
Thus, for example, for William Paley the issue a t the core of a proof for God's
existence is not the existence of the one who is his own end, but the one responsible
for the design of the world. Paley gives us a being, by way of only a probable
argument, that rnay or may not be God, that is, rnay or rnay not be identically its
own causal activity because it rnay or rnay not be its own act of being (it rnay owe
these acts to another), which can only be made known by way of a metaphysical
demonstration in the context of being as being. St. Thomas, on the other hand,
argues as a metaphysician of being as being, and is for that reason able to reach with
his mind al1 the way to the God whose name is I AM.

Concluding Note
Our interpretation of the Five Ways has shown them t o be an unfolding of a
single thing, Ipsum Esse, through varying degrees of t h e actuality of existent
contingent beings. They are five different attempts to reach Being Itself, beginning
with that which is most immediate to the human intellect, namely a being in
motion, and ending with that which is most removed from it, namelq the end of
beings and of their actions. The Five Ways are a gradually increasing plunge into
the metaphysical insight of the mystery of being which for St. Thomas is primarily
the mystery of the act of existing. To miss this point is to open oneself to a
disjointed reading of what the Theologian has put into a single article of a three-
part question of his magnum opus; it is to open oneself to seeing, through the eyes of
modern philosophical tradition, the First and the Second Ways, for example, as a
cosmological kind of argument and the Fifth as teleological. But St. Thomas knew of
only two ways of trying t o prove God's existence: the way of essentialism and the
way of existentialism. He saw these as the only possible ways because they are the
only ways in which metaphysical activity, or the philosophical study of being, can be
conducted. But modern cosmological arguments are formulated apart from the
context of a philosophy of being; the question of God's existence is largely
approached in modern philosophy as an isolated problem or a logical puzzle to be
solved rather than the mystenj of being at its deepest. Therefore, St. Thomas' Five
Ways are one kind of argument: the argument of a philosopher of existence. They
cannot be profitably read nor correctly interpreted, if we try to make them fit into
any modern classification of a proof for God's existence. Many of our
contemporaries do not see the Five Ways as leading to Ipsurn Esse Subsistens
because they are in one way or another held by essentidism.
It is because of this essentialism that [they] place the first constitutive note of the essence of God
in various other perfections [other than existence] such as immutability, aseity, infinity, eternity,
and the Iike. These philosophers, having failed to understand that existence is the supreme
perfection, cannot redise that any perfection which we attribute to God is divine because
identical with the Subsisting "To ~ e . " ~
The philosophical difficulties of essentialism and St. Thomas' alternative of pure
existentialism based largely on Aristotle's substantialism will become clear to us
only aker engaging, as we have tried to do, in the philosophy of being as being in the
way that St. Thomas does. I have tried to make sufficiently clear the need to do this
if we wish to understand why St. Thomas thinks he has demonstrated God's
existence. 1 think 1 have shown that a philosophical daim that St. Thomas has not
demonstrated God's existence must be an objection to the philosophy of being as
being-of that whichich is as existing. But modern and contemporary criticisms of the
Five Ways, which treat them (or at least some of them) as instances of the
cosmologiml argument, fail to see the role and the importance the act of existing has
in St. Thomas' philosophizing about the highest cause. This failure makes such
criticisms irrelevant to a discussion prompted by a desire to understand why St.
Thomas thinks he has successfully demonstrated that God exists.

4%
Renard, The Philosophg of God., pp. 49-50. See Aristotle's Physics, Bk. II, 3, 194b 23-24;
Metaphpics, Bk. 1,3,983a 30; Bk. V, 2,1013a 25.
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